HOW W E ’L L RE PL AC E WHAT IF THE DINOSAUR S

A NIM A L T E S T IN G NE V E R W E N T E X T IN C T ?

S C I E N C E | T E C H N O LO G Y | H E A LT H

#318 | £4.99 Feb 2018 sciencefocus.com

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 FEBRUARY 2018

A quail laid an egg in

space in 1990 –› p85

WE LCOM E W H AT W E ’ V E FO U N D
OUT THIS MONTH

I hate this time of year. While the bright lights Children born by
Caesarean section
of Christmas have faded, the grey days and
are more likely to
long nights have blurred into one featureless develop allergic
smudge. Plus, my heating bill is getting diseases –› p24
worryingly large. I’m sure I’m not the only one
who feels this way, so consider this month’s
magazine something of a ‘feel good issue’. The
magazine’s features have been chosen because
we hope they’ll brighten up your February just
a little.
First up, we’re sharing the science that makes us feel better about
the future. On p37 we talk to the scientists working to overcome some Part of the
of humankind’s biggest challenges – famine, climate change, Whitechapel
fatberg will go on
antibiotic resistance and mass extinction – and find out why their display in the
innovative work makes them hopeful about our future. Museum of London
If that doesn’t leave a smile on your face, then the story of Kirk this month –› p95
Rutter should. At the age of 47, after the death of his mother, he fell
into a long and untreatable depression, until a groundbreaking,
experimental treatment rebooted his brain and helped him get back
on track. Discover the science that changed his life on p56. Scientists
And finally, if you prefer a bit of escapism to cheer you up, we asked can add
the experts for an alternate history lesson. On p62, we find out what nanoparticles to
life would have been like if the asteroid that killed off the dinosaurs plants to make
had arrived just a few minutes earlier… them glow in the
dark –› p20
Enjoy the issue!

If the asteroid that

killed off the
dinosaurs had hit
Daniel Bennett, Editor just a few minutes
earlier, it’s likely
there would be
dinosaurs still
alive today –› p62

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 CONTENTS

CO NTE NTS

37 27
COVER
STORY
REGULARS
8 Eye opener
Stunning images from around the planet.

10 Reply
See what’s been in our inbox this month…

13 Discoveries
This month’s most exciting science news.

24 Michael Mosley
Our new monthly columnist investigates
the microbiome.

27 Innovations
Our roundup of the best new tech and
gadgets from this year’s CES.

79 Helen Czerski
Helen wraps up warm to investigate the
science of frost.

81 Q&A
This month: How far do germs travel when
we cough? Can chickens lay eggs in space?
Why is air invisible?

90 Out there
This month’s best science activities.

96 Crossword
Give that grey matter a workout!

98 Life scientific
Dr Susan Finkbeiner on the diverse worlds of
entomology and catwalk modelling.

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62
FEATURES
RES 73 Can’t wait until next month
m
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to get
d tech? The
Science Focus websitee is packed with
W
Why the endd news, articles and Q&A As to keep your
COVER isn’t nigh brain satisfied. science
efocus.com

37
STORY
We meet f our
enterprisin
ng scientists
who are taackling the
world’s biggest problems.

How hallucinnogens
reset depresssed
minds

56
Research ssuggests that
the psychedelic part of
magic mushrooms
could help cure depreession. SPECIAL ISSUE
What if the 56
dinosaurs neever
went extinctt?

62
If the dinosaurs hadn’t
died out, then the
world – annd our ON
beloved pets – would d look very SALE
different today. NOW

Can we end
THE SCIENCE OF H
HAPPINESS
animal testin
ng?

73
This special edition from the
Stem cell reesearch, 3D BBC Focuss team reveals how the
printing and computer latest research can help you tackle
modelling aare widely stress, improve your wellbeing
w and
used in research. So ccould they be feel happier.
used to replace animaal tests? buysubscriptions.com/fo
ocuscollection

7
 EYE OPENER

Peekaboo!
PADRE BURGOS,
PHILIPPINES

Watch your step… this

stargazer fish is waiting for a
meal. So-called because of the
eyes on the tops of their heads,
stargazers use their fins as
shovels to burrow themselves
into the sand, leaping out
to ambush any prey that
passes overhead.
“I spotted the fish during a
night dive when my torchlight
caught its eyes,” says
photographer Reinart van
Meteren. “It was about 30cm
long, probably waiting to
ambush one of the smaller fish
close by. I gently moved the
water on top of it in order to
uncover its face, and then I had
a few seconds to take the shot
before it buried itself back into
the sand.”
Stargazers use their large,
upward-facing mouths to
create a vacuum, sucking in
their unsuspecting prey. Some
species can also create electric
shocks of up to 50V, thanks to
a specialised organ located
behind their eyes – handy for
warding off potential
predators or confusing a
potential snack.

PHOTO: REINART VAN METEREN

8
9
FEBRUARY 2018

RE PLY
Your opinions on science, technology and BBC Focus
g reply@sciencefocus.com
, Fairfax
BBC Focuss, Tower House,
Street, Bristol, BS1 3BN
@sciencefocus
www.facebook.com/sciencefocus

M ES SAG E O F T H E MO N T H
a contributing factor, but in the study
(bit.ly/2n4SHta) it seemed that alcoholic
Mining for good wine performed better than a non-
alcoholic analogy, lending credence to the
Speaking as someone who has been involved in idea that a small portion of alcohol offers
cryptocurrencies for some years, I was pleasantly some benefit.
surprised by your article in the January 2018 issue. Your – Daniel Bennett, editor
report was well balanced, kudos.
However, there are more ways to become involved Alphabet soup
without necessarily investing money. While Bitcoin In the January issue off BBC Focus,
‘mining’ is now industrial scale and beyond the reach of you look at how scientists have
individuals, there are some cryptocurrencies directly expanded the genetic alphabet. It
connected with scientific/humanitarian endeavour that left me wondering how is it that 64
average people can use. Gridcoin (gridcoin.science) lets SolarCoin is a cryptocurrency that RNA triplets (codons) can code for
rewards generation of solar energy
you ‘mine’ Gridcoins by allowing scientists to use your only 20 amino acids? There must
home computer to process data for research projects. Raisin a drink be more possibilities, even though
Research ranges from cures for childhood cancers, to (as it happens) only 20 occur
mapping the Milky Way in 3D, running particle effort to have a month free of naturally!
collision data at the LHC and much more. The more alcohol, as described in his article Similarly, how can 216 synthetic
research you do, the more Gridcoins you get. in the January edition of BBC codons code for only 172 amino
FoldingCoin and Curecoin are similar and do protein- Focus. I was particularly acids? And how is 216 related
folding work on the Folding@Home project. Meanwhile, interested in the small study to 64?
readers with solar panels may wish to investigate quoted in the box on p48 in which Simon Bartlett, via email
SolarCoin. The SolarCoin Foundation issues a those drinking the red wine with
SolarCoin for each 1MWh of verified solar energy the alcohol removed appeared to Good question. First we must consider
produced. The aim is to incentivise the transition to do as well as those drinking the that codons are made of groups of three of
clean energy. The list goes on: Einsteinium aims to raise ordinary red wine, suggesting that the four different bases (nucleotides) joined
money for research grants; Pinkcoin is based on it was not the alcohol but a together. This means we have a total of 43,
generating money for charities. Readers should be wary constituent of the grapes that was or 64, different combinations and so gives
of scams and check a cryptocurrency’s authenticity producing the benefit. Grapes, and us the 64 different codons. So far, so good.
(including those I have mentioned) – any promises of particularly raisins (dried grapes), However, in most cases the same amino
huge investment returns is an immediate warning sign. have high levels of antioxidants acid can be made from several different
Keep an eye on the HMRC guidance in relation to taxes, and it would seem this was codons, this of course limits the total
and seek professional advice if uncertain. producing the reduction number of amino acids that can
Steve, via email in blood pressure and be coded. For example,
C-reactive proteins. arginine is formed from
These are all worthy options, which then let you trade the Rather than trying six different codons.
currencies you earn for other cryptocurrencies. As Steve says, to justify the Also, there are three
always exercise caution when trading money. – Ed drinking of wine, so-called ‘stop codons’
it would seem that do not code for an
WRITE IN AND WIN! better to have amino acid but instead
raisins rather than signal the end of the
The writer of next issue’s Message Of The Month
crisps and try not translation process and
wins a stylish Kitsound Voice One speaker. This
smart speaker has room-filling stereo sound, to drink alcohol the end of the protein
PHOTOS: GETTY X3

built-in Amazon Alexa, a splash-resistant
coating and multiroom technology – connect
up to eight together to wirelessly to fill your
home with epic sound. kitsound.co.uk
(with all its other ill chain. The same case applies
effects) at all. in the synthetic example
Dr Roger Webber, Scotland meaning only 172 amino acids can be
WORTH produced despite there being 216 codons.
£130
The antioxidants in the grapes could be – Jason Goodyer, commissioning editor

10

Slow food
In the Christmas edition of BBC
Focus (p80) you list the top 10
sleepiest animals. Unfortunately,
no explanations were given. We
have three cats who seem to spend
most days sleeping. This is, I
believe, typical of the cat family.
Discussing this with my wife, who
has always owned cats, she
suggests they need lots of sleep to
recoup energy following strenuous
hunting trips. However, though
our cats are most active at night,
their forays into the garden seem
sporadic and hardly warranting
the amount of sleep they get. In
the wild, no doubt cats expend a
lot of energy stalking prey
unsuccessfully so that after a kill
they need a good lie down. Or do
they need long periods of sleep to
allow their bodies time to digest
their almost entirely meat diet?
However, many of the animals on
your list are vegetarians, so what’s
their excuse? Do they need lots of
rest due to a low-energy diet, or are
there other reasons?
Maurice, via email
Cats are crepuscular animals, meaning
they are naturally more active at dusk and
LETTERS MAY BE EDITED FOR PUBLICATION
dawn. Sometimes they can also appear to
be fast asleep when they’re actually
snoozing. They go into a light sleep, lying in
wait for some prey to come by. Obviously,
in domestic cats these behaviours are
hangovers from their ancestors. The
herbivores in our list typically eat food that
is low in nutrients, so they lead a soporific
lifestyle to avoid expending too much
energy (we’re looking at you koalas).
– Daniel Bennett, editor
A dense matter
I regret I could not fully
understand Dr Alistair Gunn’s
answer to the question “How
dense is the Universe?”, which
appeared in the January issue of
BBC Focus. However, I remember
from a lecture given by
Astronomer Royal Dr Martin Rees
some 20 years ago that he stated
that the Universe has a density
exactly the same as a sheet of
paper, in this case 80gsm. Dr
Martin Rees did not split the
answer into visible or dark matter
nor mention energy in this
particular comment. This is the
sort of picture I can readily equate
Do domestic cats with – surprising though that
need lots of sleep, or
are they simply lazy,
comment was.
ponders Maurice Hally Hardie, Peterborough
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11
 D I S PATC H E S F R O M T H E C U T T I N G E D G E
FEBRUARY 2018 EDITED BY JASON GOODYER

BIOLOGY

MEET ZHONG ZHONG AND HUA HUA –

THE WORLD’S FIRST MONKEYS CLONED
THE SAME WAY AS DOLLY
Two genetically identical long-tailed
macaque clones have been successfully
bred by Chinese researchers
A pair of primate clones bred using somatic cell
nuclear transfer (SCNT), the technique used to
create Dolly the sheep more than 20 years ago,
have been born at the Chinese Academy of
Sciences in Shanghai.
The newborns are just several weeks old and
have been named Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua
after the Chinese adjective ‘zhonghua’, which
means Chinese nation or people. They are
PHOTO: QIANG SUN/MU-MING POO/CHINESE ACADEMY OF SCIENCES

13
DISCOVERIES

HOW DOES SCNT

Ultrasound scans of surrogate uteruses from the SCNT process. The uterus on the left contains no
foetus, but the one on the right has been successfully impregnated and the foetus can be seen
currently being bottle-fed and are
developing normally compared to other
monkeys their age.
In SCNT, the nucleus is removed from an
egg cell and is replaced with a different
nucleus from another cell. The egg cell
then merges with the implanted nucleus
and develops into a clone of whatever it
was that donated the nucleus.
Previously, in sheep, mice and cows,
adult donor cells have been used to
create healthy clones. However, adult
primate cells proved resistant to the
technique. The Shanghai team overcame
this by using donor cells taken from a
macaque foetus.
While Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua are the
first primates to be cloned using this
This will enable researchers to study
primates in unprecedented detail, as well
as help with the development of drugs and
therapies for use in humans. “There are a
lot of questions about primate biology that
can be studied by having this additional
model,” said Prof Qiang Sun. “This will
generate real models, not just for
genetically based brain diseases, but also
cancer, immune or metabolic disorders and
allow us to test the efficacy of the drugs for
these conditions before clinical use.”
The researchers are eager to point out
that they are following strict guidelines for
animal research set by the US National
Institutes of Health, and accept that the
scientific community should debate
acceptable laboratory practices concerning
CLONING WORK?
A cell in an early embryo has
something akin to a superpower. It
can transform into any part of the
organism, a skin cell perhaps, a
muscle cell, a nerve cell or a blood
cell. Before Dolly, everyone assumed
that in mammals this process of
specialisation, so-called
‘differentiation’, was irreversible.
Dolly proved otherwise.
Scientists start with an egg cell 1 .
The nucleus (the part of the cell that
contains the majority of the genetic
material) is removed from the egg
cell 2 . A single differentiated cell is
picked up by a tiny needle. In Dolly’s
case, the differentiated cell was an
udder cell from an adult donor 3 .
The cell is injected into the egg cell
and a small electrical pulse is used to
fuse the nucleus into its new
environment and to kick-start cell
division 4 . The egg cell and
differentiated cell fuse. You can see
in this image that the egg cell now
has a nucleus (upper centre) 5 . The
embryo is implanted into the uterus

PHOTOS: SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY X5, GETTY

technique, primates have been cloned in
the past. In 1999, a rhesus macaque called
Tetra became the first primate to be cloned,
though this was achieved using a simpler
method called embryo splitting. Here, the
EGNNU KP VJG|GODT[Q|CTG URNKV CHVGT TGCEJKPI
the eight-cell stage to create four identical
two-cell embryos in a manner similar to
naturally occurring twins.
The breakthrough will make it possible
to breed genetically uniform monkeys.
the cloning of non-human primates. “We of a surrogate female. She carries the
are very aware that future research using clone to term 6 .
non-human primates anywhere in the
world depends on scientists following very
strict ethical standards,” explained co-
author Prof Muming Poo.
They now plan to continue improving
the technique and expect more macaque
clones to be born over the coming months.
If you’re interested in the debate around
animal testing, turn to p73.

TIMELINE: ANIMALS WE’VE CLONED

1894 1902 1952 1962 1963

German Hans In the US, Instead of using Chinese

biologist Hans Spemann, Robert Briggs nuclei from frog embryologist
Driesch takes a another and Thomas embryos, Tong Dizhou
two-cell sea German King perform a Oxford biologist applies the
urchin from scientist, successful John Gurdon same technique
the Bay of Naples and shakes uses a fine hair from his nuclear transfer, by moving a takes them from adults, to fish, though his work,
it in beaker of water. The cells baby son to split a nucleus from an embryonic demonstrating that a originally published in his
part, giving rise to two, salamander embryo in two. frog cell into an egg cell differentiated nucleus still native Chinese, does not
independent but identical, The result: two amphibians whose own nucleus had has the power to build an receive much attention
sea urchins. for the price of one. been removed. entire animal. beyond China.

14
 FEBRUARY 2018

1 2

3 4

5 6

1996 1999 2001 2001 2005

The cloning of A team led by Researchers Scientists at Controversial

Dolly the
sheep builds
on Gurdon’s
method, showing that the
nucleus from a differen-
tiated cell retains the ability
to make an entire animal
from scratch, even in
mammals.
Prof Gerald
Schatten
create Tetra,
a rhesus macaque, using
embryo splitting. Here, the
cells in the embryo are split
after reaching the eight–
cell stage to create four
identical two-cell embryos.
at Texas A&M Advanced South Korean
University Cell scientist
create the Technology Hwang
first cloned in the US are the first to Woo-Suk
pet, using a cell from a clone an endangered uses the ear cell from an
brown-and-white tabby species. Noah the gaur, a Afghan hound to make
cat called Rainbow to make species of wild ox native to Snuppy, the world’s first
‘CC’ (aka ‘Copy Cat’ or Asia, dies from dysentery cloned dog. A Labrador acts
‘Carbon Copy’). after two days. as surrogate mother.

15
DISCOVERIES
DINOSAURS
‘RAINBOW
DINOSAUR’
MAY HAVE
HAD GLITTERY
FEATHERS
Just call it the disco dinosaur. Caihong juji, a
newly discovered duck-sized dinosaur that
lived around 160 million years ago in what is
now China, had a vibrant rainbow crest and
iridescent hummingbird-like plumage, a team
of international researchers say.
The finding was made following the analysis
of an immaculately preserved C. juji fossil – a
name meaning ‘rainbow with big crest’ in
Mandarin – first discovered by a farmer in
northeastern China in 2014. The feathers on
the fossil are so well preserved that the
researchers were able to determine their
minute colour-bearing structures.
“When you look at the fossil record, you
normally only see hard parts like bone, but
every once in a while, soft parts like feathers
are preserved, and you get a glimpse into the
past,” said Chad Eliason, who took part in the
research. “The preservation of this dinosaur is
16
incredible, we were really excited when we ABOVE: The shimmering,
multicoloured feathers on
realised the level of detail we were able to see the rainbow dinosaur may
on the feathers.” have been used to attract
By examining the feathers using powerful a mate
microscopes, the researchers were able to make
out the imprints of melanosomes, which are
PHOTOS: VELIZAR SIMEONOVSKI, DR QUEENIE HOI SHAN CHAN
the parts of cells that contain colour pigments.
While there was very little of the pigment itself
present, the shape of the melanosomes alone
was enough for the scientists to determine the
colour of the feathers. This is because
melanosomes reflect light in different colours
depending on their shape. It turns out that the
pancake-shaped melanosomes in C. juji most
closely match those of modern hummingbirds.
Colourful plumage is frequently used by
birds to attract mates, so the rainbow feathers
of C. juji may well have been a prehistoric
version of a peacock’s iridescent tail, the
researchers say.
 FEBRUARY 2018

SPACE

EERIE BLUE SPACE ROCKS

I N N U M B E RS
130
The average sound level, in
decibels, of a rooster’s crow.
This is equivalent to a jet
taking off at a distance of
15 metres. X-ray images
have shown that roosters
appear to have special flaps
in their ears that partially
close off the ear canals
when they crow, to protect
their hearing.
CONTAIN INGREDIENTS
VITAL FOR LIFE
Tiny crystals found embedded in two
meteorites contain water and complex
organic compounds – ingredients
essential for the development of life.
The crystal fragments were
painstakingly extracted from two
different meteorites, named Monahans
and Zag, that have been stored at NASA’s
Johnson Space Center in Texas since they
landed in 1998. Monahans smashed into
the ground in Texas in March that year,
while Zag plunged to Earth near
Morocco in the August.
Cutting-edge X-ray scans of the
crystals showed them to contain a range
associated with liquid water that is
really crucial to the origin of life and the
origin of complex organic compounds in
space,” said the Open University’s Dr
Queenie Chan. “We’re looking at the
organic ingredients that can lead to the
origin of life.”
A detailed study of the chemistry of
the tiny blue and purple crystals
suggests they may have originally been
seeded by volcanic activity on Ceres,
which is a brown dwarf planet that is the
largest object in the asteroid belt
between the orbits of Mars and Jupiter.
“Things are not as simple as we

23,
of organic chemical components
including carbon, oxygen and nitrogen,
as well as amino acids needed to form
proteins. They also carried microscopic
thought they were,” Chan said.
“Everything leads to the conclusion that
the origin of life is really possible
elsewhere. There is a great range of

249,
traces of water believed to date back to
the infancy of the Solar System about 4.5
billion years ago.
“This is really the first time we have
organic compounds within these
meteorites, including very primitive
type of organics that likely represent the
early Solar System’s organic

425
found abundant organic matter also composition.”

The number of digits This blue crystal, which contains water and compounds essential for life, was found within the Zag meteorite

belonging to the largest

prime number ever
discovered. It was found
on Boxing Day by the Great
Internet Messene Prime
Search – an international
collaboration searching
for the largest numbers
that are divisible only by
themselves and one.

347
The length, in km, of an
underwater cave found on
the Yucatan Peninsula on the
eastern coast of Mexico – the
longest ever discovered.

17
DISCOVERIES
SPACE
HUGE SLABS OF ICE
DETECTED BENEATH THE
SURFACE OF MARS COULD
SUSTAIN HUMAN COLONY
One of the many problems standing in the way of
humans establishing a colony on the Red Planet is
obtaining a supply of fresh drinking water. Now,
researchers using NASA’s Mars Reconnaissance
Orbiter (MRO) may have found a solution: there are
at least eight sites where thick deposits of ice
buried beneath the planet’s surface are exposed in
faces of eroding slopes. The team located the sites
using the High-Resolution Imaging Science
Experiment (HiRISE) camera on the MRO. The ice
was likely deposited as snow long ago and is
thought to consist of relatively pure water ice.
It was known from previous missions that
around a third of the surface of Mars contains
shallow ground ice as well as thicker deposits
18
PHOTOS: NASA, DUKE UNIVERSITY ILLUSTRATION: DANIEL BRIGHT
at the poles. However, the new findings show cliffs Underground ice
exposed at one of
of ice more than 100m thick in detail. Mars’s steep slopes
“The finding gives us surprising windows where appears here as a bright
blue band
we can see right into these thick underground
sheets of ice,” said Shane Byrne, who co-authored
the report. “It’s like having one of those ant farms
where you can see through the glass on the side to
learn about what’s usually hidden beneath the
ground. Astronauts could essentially just go there
with a bucket and a shovel and get all the water
they need.”
Other than providing potential colonisers with a
supply of drinking water, the discovery may help
us learn more about the long-term patterns in
Mars’s climate that led to the ice’s formations.

BIOLOGY
FUNCTIONING HUMAN MUSCLE
GROWN FROM STEM CELLS
Forget hitting the gym, this is a much
more efficient way of building
muscle: a team at Duke University
has grown functioning human
skeletal muscle using induced
pluripotent stem cells. The
researchers say that this
breakthrough could help them treat
diseases such as muscular dystrophy.
The muscles were grown using
pluripotent stem cells. These are cells
taken from adult non-muscle tissues,
such as skin or blood, and
reprogrammed to revert to a nascent
state. These stem cells were grown
into muscle tissue by flooding them
with a molecule called Pax7 – a key
component in the formation of
muscle tissue.
The team then grew the cells in a
3D scaffold, encouraging them to
form muscle fibres that could
Cross-section of muscle
fibre grown from induced
pluripotent stem cells.
The green areas are
muscle cells, the blue
areas are cell nuclei,
and the red areas are
the surrounding
support matrix
contract and respond to external
stimuli, just like living muscle. The
team then transplanted the muscle
into mice, where it began to integrate
into the existing tissue. It was not as
strong as naturally grown muscle,
but still holds promise for treating
degenerative muscle diseases.
“The prospect of studying rare
diseases is especially exciting for us,”
said Prof Nenad Bursac. “When a
child’s muscles are already withering
away from something like Duchenne
muscular dystrophy, it would not be
ethical to take muscle samples from
them and do further damage. But
with this technique, we can just take
a small sample of non-muscle tissue,
like skin or blood, revert the obtained
cells to a pluripotent state, and
eventually grow an endless amount
of functioning muscle fibres to test.”
FEBRUARY 2018
THE FOUL-MOUTHED
Holy &#$%! A team at Maastricht University has
found Facebook users who are more prone to using
profane language often post more trustworthy
content, especially when expressing negative
emotions such as anger, exasperation or fear.
MALE CYCLISTS
Think cycling makes men impotent? On yer bike!
A team at the University of California has found
that cycling has no greater impact on male sexual
and urinary health than running or swimming.
G O O D M O NTH
BA D M O NTH
MICROWAVE COOKS
Having a ready meal habit may be just as bad for
the environment as it is for your waistline. A study
by the University of Manchester has found that
the yearly CO2 emissions from just 19 microwaves
are comparable to those of a family car.
CRIMINALS
Bad luck, bad guys! A statistical analysis carried
out by psychologists at Johannes Gutenberg in
Germany has determined that the so-called ‘CSI
effect’, which was once thought to help criminals
find out how to conceal their crimes by watching
TV crime shows, is a myth.
19
DISCOVERIES
CHEMISTRY
“If you had these plants on a wall, you
would contribute to ambient lighting”
%JGOKUVUCTGGPIKPGGTKPIQTICPKUOUYKVJQWVIGPGVKEOQFKƂECVKQP
by adding tiny, nanoscopic parts. Prof Michael Strano of MIT
reveals how he used ‘nanobionics’ to create glowing plants
Why add bionic parts to plants?
Plants have a number of properties we don’t
encounter in synthetic materials: plants self-
repair, they’re easy to recycle, they’re low-cost.
But importantly, they harvest energy from the
Sun via photosynthesis, then store that energy in
BELOW: Prof Michael
the form of sugars and starches. So you can think
Strano from MIT of a plant as a combination of solar cell and
battery. Plant ‘nanobionics’
seeks to work out the ways
that you could transform a
living plant and use these
capabilities. We’re using
small nanoparticles that can
enter the plant and interact
with biochemical pathways
to give it new functions.
How did you make
glowing plants?
A light-emitting plant uses
three different kinds of
nanoparticles. We put them
into the plant through pores
on the surface of the leaf. The
reason why we need three
20
nanoparticles is pretty technical, but basically
they have the net effect of taking some of the
plant’s stored energy and converting it into green
light. One of the particles has an enzyme called
luciferase, which is the one that allows fireflies to
glow. We’ve started working on an on/off switch
to have the plant emit light when it’s dark but
then, when there’s incident sunlight, turn off and
just recharge.
How much light do they produce?
The plants glow for about 3.5 hours. The
brightness is easily visible with the naked eye. We
PHOTOS: MIT, BOB O’CONNOR ILLUSTRATIONS: DAN BRIGHT
looked at kale, watercress and spinach. We do a
brightness test with a 10cm watercress or arugula
[rocket] plant, and they currently give out about a
thousandth of the amount of light needed to read
by – but that’s a really high illumination
standard. The amount of light we generate now is
actually enough for what architects call ‘indirect
lighting’, so if you had a bunch of these plants
lined up along a wall, you would contribute to
ambient lighting.
What are the advantages of nanobionics?
We don’t have to make a new organism, we can go

ABOVE: Two nanobionic
watercress plants
up to an existing plant and modify it. Our
illuminating the pages modification stays with that plant – there’s no
of a book danger in uncontrollably reproducing these traits
throughout the environment, which are concerns
that are sometimes raised with genetically-
engineered plants. Seven per cent of all energy
usage is from lighting, so even if we could make a
modest dent in that usage, it would have an
impact in terms of carbon dioxide release.
Another reason is they’re beautiful. I think
they’re going to form an important contribution to
our aesthetic environment. For the next three
years, we’re going to study how to make a plant
brighter, and how to use it in architecture.
What else could bionic plants do?
We have a lot of ideas, some are pretty crazy. Last
year we published a study on a chemical-sensing
plant: it measures chemicals in its environment
then sends an infrared signal to your phone. We
demonstrated that it can measure explosives in
groundwater. This idea of a ‘sentinel plant’ is
gaining traction. Modifying the operation of
plants using nanoparticles is not just speculative,
we think they’re going to be widely used in plant
engineering in agriculture.
FEBRUARY 2018
T H E Y D I D W H AT ?!
‘SWEATING’ ROBOT
CREATED
What did they do?
A team of researchers at the University of
Tokyo have created Kengoro, a humanoid
robot that ‘sweats’ to cool itself down
when completing a workout consisting of
push-ups, sit-ups and pull-ups.
Why did they do that?
The robot is designed to have anatomically
correct musculoskeletal structures closely
resembling those of humans. However, the
researchers initially had difficulty in
preventing Kengoro’s complex machinery
from overheating when performing
complex actions. The solution was to
punch a network of tiny holes in the robot’s
frame and use it to carry water around the
various structures. As the robot heats up,
the water evaporates, cooling it down in
much the same way as sweat cools
down humans.
What could it be used for?
So far, Kengoro can perform around 100
different types of subtle movement –
around a quarter of what a human is
capable of, if you discount facial muscles.
Even so, the research has many possible
future applications, including the
design of better crash dummies and more
efficient prosthetics.
21
DISCOVERIES
SPACE
NASA’S COMPACT NUCLEAR REACTORS
COULD POWER COLONIES ON MARS
If humans are ever to build colonies on the Moon
or on Mars, we are going to need a reliable way of
powering essentials such as lighting, water and
oxygen supply – not to mention a means of
producing fuel for the long schlep home.
Enter Kilopower, NASA’s pioneering compact
nuclear fission reactor currently being put
through its paces at the space agency’s Nevada
National Security Site (NNSS).
The prototype power system was designed and
developed by NASA’s Glenn Research Center in
collaboration with NASA’s Marshall Space Flight
Center and the Los Alamos National Laboratory.
It is hoped that the power system could provide
up to 10 kilowatts of electrical power – enough to
run two average households – continuously for at
least 10 years. Just four Kilopower units would
provide sufficient power to establish an outpost,
the team says.
22
Artist’s impression
of four Kilopower units
on the surface of Mars
The team has chosen to work on fission power
due to the challenging conditions that must be
“ON THE endured if a space colony is to be successfully
built. On Mars, the Sun’s power varies widely
MOON, throughout the seasons, and on the Moon, the
cold lunar night lingers for 14 days – ruling out
KILOPOWER the option of solar power.
“We want a power source that can handle
COULD BE extreme environments,” said Lee Mason, NASA’s
DEPLOYED principal technologist for power and energy
PHOTOS: NASA, UNIVERSITY OF BRISTOL
storage. “Kilopower opens up the full surface of
TO HELP Mars, including the northern latitudes where
water may reside. On the Moon, Kilopower could
SEARCH FOR be deployed to help search for resources in
permanently shadowed craters.”
RESOURCES” Kilopower tests recently began at the NNSS
and will conclude with a full-power test
lasting approximately 28 hours towards the end
of March this year.
 FEBRUARY 2018

TH I N G S W E
LE A R N E D TH I S
M O NTH

TEA BOOSTS
CREATIVITY ENGINEERING
Want to get your creative
juices flowing? Have a
cuppa. A team at Peking
University has found that
ACOUSTIC TRACTOR BEAM
students performed better
in creativity tests after
drinking a cup of regular
BREAKTHROUGH COULD LEAD
black tea. Put a brew on!
TO LEVITATING HUMANS
IT’S MUCH EASIER Here’s an idea that is really gaining traction: for made up of a loud sound surrounding a silent
TO CATCH FLU THAN the first time, University of Bristol engineers core. They were then able to increase the size of
WE THOUGHT have created an acoustic tractor beam capable of the silent core, allowing it to hold larger objects.
We all know it’s best to trapping objects larger than the wavelength of Using ultrasonic waves at a pitch of 40kHz, a
steer clear of a friend who the sound being used. frequency above human hearing but detectable
is coughing and spluttering This discovery could lead to technology by dogs, the researchers held a two-centimetre
in the midst of flu season. capable of manoeuvring drug capsules around polystyrene sphere stationary in the tractor
However, a team at the the body, container-less transportation systems, beam. The sphere was more than two acoustic
University of Maryland has and even the levitation of humans for medical or wavelengths in size, making it the largest object
found that infectious to be trapped in a tractor beam.
other purposes, the engineers say.
particles can be spread
Researchers previously thought that acoustic The finding gives hope that larger objects,
simply by breathing.
tractor beams were limited to levitating small such as humans, could be levitated using the
objects. This is because previous attempts to same technique, the researchers say.
ADOLESCENCE NOW trap particles larger than the wavelength of the “Acoustic tractor beams have huge potential
LASTS UNTIL 24 sound being used were unstable, with levitated in many applications,” said Prof Bruce
According to research objects spinning out of control. Drinkwater, who supervised the research. “I’m
carried out at the Royal The team found a workaround for this particularly excited by the idea of contactless
Children’s Hospital in problem by using rapidly fluctuating tornadoes production lines where delicate objects are
Melbourne, Australia, the of sound – essentially a twister-like structure assembled without touching them.”
recognised age at which
adolescence ends should
be raised to 24 – up from A polystyrene ball levitates
in ultrasonic soundwaves
19. The study concludes
that people are staying in
education longer and
getting married later, and
there is evidence that some
people continue growing
into their 20s.

OUR NOSES GO COLD

WHEN WE THINK
TOO HARD
A team at the University of
Nottingham has found that
our schnozzles drop in
temperature when we face
a complex mental task.
The effect is thought to
be due to the body
diverting blood from the
extremities to help out
hardworking neurons.

23
 DOCTOR’S ORDERS
MICHAEL MOSLEY ON… THE MICROBIOME
“IF YOU BEFRIEND YOUR GUT BACTERIA, COULD
YOU HELP YOUR IMMUNE SYSTEM TO THRIVE?”
ne of the hottest topics
O
in 2017 was the
microbiome, and I’m
predicting that gut
microbes will
continue to stir the emotions of
scientists and consumers in 2018.
For those who are not familiar
with the more intimate content of
your bowels, the gut microbiome is a
term that covers the one to two
kilograms of assorted microbes that
live in your guts and are essential to
your health. There are at least 1,000
different species down there, made
up of trillions of different cells.
Although that is a big number, in
the past it was wildly exaggerated.
We are not ‘90 per cent bacteria’ and
‘10 per cent human’, as many books
and articles have claimed, but more
like 50:50. In fact, one researcher
who helped explode that particular
myth claimed the proportions are so
similar that “each defecation event
may flip the ratio to favour human
cells over bacteria”.
As a medical student, I was taught
that the main role of our gut
microbes was to protect us from
dangerous invaders and synthesise a
few vitamins. Now we know they do
far more than that. Among other
things (like influencing our mood
and weight), those little microbes
help regulate our entire immune
system. Big claims? Certainly.
Over the last half-century we have
seen a massive rise in allergic
diseases, such as asthma and eczema, caused by an
overactive immune system. We have also seen a surge in
ILLUSTRATION: JAMES OLSTEIN
autoimmune diseases, ranging from inflammatory bowel
disease (IBD) to type 1 diabetes, which are primarily
caused by an immune system that has got out of control.
One of the reasons for this rise seems to be that over time
we have laid waste to a particular population of microbes
24
Dr Michael Mosley is a science
writer and broadcaster, who
presents Trust Me, I’m A Doctor
on BBC Two. His latest book is
The Clever Guts Diet (£8.99,
Short Books).
that live in the gut and are known to
immunologists as the ‘Old Friends’.
They’ve been given that name
because they have evolved with us
over millions of years, and are vital
for our health. Without enough of
your Old Friends around, so the
theory goes, your immune system
behaves like a drunken teenager,
smashing up its own home. A recent
study, for example, found that one of
the Old Friends, a gut bacteria called
Bacteroides, helps prevent IBD by
recruiting white blood cells to kill a
cell of the immune system that can
trigger IBD.
So why did it all go wrong? What
has happened to the Old Friends?
Well, a diet of antibiotics and junk
food hasn’t been good for their long
term health. We also know that
children who are born by Caesarean
section (which is increasingly
common) are far more likely to
develop allergic diseases later in life,
possibly because they are less likely
than those born vaginally to inherit
their mother’s Old Friends.
The good news is that it’s never too
late to try and give your Old Friends
a bit of a boost. I am now a big fan of
home-made fermented foods like
sauerkraut, which are rich in living
bacteria. I have also switched to a
diet that has more of the foods that
will help my microbiome thrive
(mainly those that contain plenty of
fermentable fibres).
I’m also steering clear of the
prebiotics, probiotics and
supplements that are sold in the
shops. From what I’ve learnt, few
have credible science behind them
and most of what is sold is based on
hype. That may change, though.
Watch this space.
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C E S R E P OR T 2 0 18
FEBRUARY 2018 EDITED BY RUSSELL DEEKS

A LEAP
INTO THE
FUTURE
After years of hints and speculation, mixed
reality start-up Magic Leap (valued at close
to $2bn) finally unveiled its first headset at
the recent Consumer Electronics Show
(CES) in Las Vegas.
The Magic Leap One system consists of a
pair of goggles, a miniaturised, belt-worn
PC and a handheld controller. Its creators
say the device makes use of lightfield
technology, which records a map of how
light reaches a camera lens. With this
information, the Magic Leap team says it
can convincingly mix the virtual with the
real. For example, while wearing the specs,
animated characters could spring out of
your kid’s storybook, or a PC display could
load up on your fridge door. There’s still no
word as to a commercial release, but
developer kits are expected to start shipping
early this year, so it can’t be too far off.
There were plenty of other virtual reality
and mixed reality headsets at CES,
including the Vive Pro from HTC (with a
much higher-res display than the existing
Vive); the eye-tracking, EEG-equipped
Looxid VR; the affordable, fold-out Aryzon;
the Alexa-enabled Vuzix system; and the X1
headset from Third Eye. Depending how
cynical you are, this either means that
human communication and interaction is
about to be disrupted like never before,
or that Pokémon Go is about to get a bit
more convincing...
INNOVATIONS | CES REPORT 2018
MY SCREEN’S
BIGGEST…
If there was one obvious ‘theme’ at this
year’s CES, it was really, really big
screens. Garnering most of the headlines
was Samsung’s aptly-named The Wall: a
146-inch 4K TV made up of self-emitting
MicroLEDs, as used in Samsung cinema
screens. But LG wasn’t far behind,
touting both a 4K tower projector (the
HU80KA) that’ll throw a 150-inch screen
onto any available surface, and a 65-inch
OLED screen that can be rolled up like a
newspaper. Nvidia got in on the ‘bigger is
better’ action too, with a 65-inch, 4K ‘big
format gaming display’ – basically a
huge PC monitor with Nvidia Shield
streaming capabilities built-in.
There was no word regarding pricing
or availability for any of the above, but
we don’t foresee them being cheap. Sony
was showing off a 120-inch projector that
can be yours in the spring for a mere
£22,000, but back in the real world, CES
visitors could check out plenty of new 4K
sets with HDR screens and/or built-in
digital assistants (Bixby in Samsung’s
case, Google Assistant in LG’s). Ever keen
to stay one step ahead, Samsung was
showing off 8K televisions that should be
available before the end of the year…
28
Samsung’s ‘The Wall’: not
good for tiny apartments
What’s 8K all
about, then?
Less than 30 per cent of
televisions sold worldwide
in 2017 featured 4K
displays, and 4K broadcasts
are still few and far
between. But that isn’t
stopping manufacturers
pushing the next step: 8K.
The 8K standard refers to
screens with a resolution of
7,680 × 4,320 pixels. That’s
four times the pixel count of
a 4K screen, or 16 times that
of a Full HD (1080p) TV. 8K
LG’s roll-up is the highest resolution
OLED screen
available on any current TV
set, though 8K models are
quite thin on the ground,
and likely to remain
prohibitively expensive for
the foreseeable future.
The technology is proving
popular with film-makers,
though – partly because if
you shoot in 8K then crop-
and-zoom to 4K, the camera
operator needn’t get so close
to the subject. Which is
LG’s new projector
sends a 150-inch image handy if you’re filming
onto any surface tornadoes, or lions…
 FEBRUARY 2018

1 2 3

4 5 6

SIX OF THE BEST… PORTABLE COMPUTERS

CES 2018 was awash with new laptops, tablets and hybrids – here are some of the most interesting

1 BUSINESS BOOK 2 RAZOR SHARP 3 FEELING ZEN

X1 Carbon is the cheapest of Lenovo’s
three new Thinkpads. Like the rest
of the range, it features an onboard
e-SIM so it’s always connected,
a Dolby Vision HDR display and
a privacy shutter for the webcam.
It also has 16GB of RAM and up to
1TB of SSD storage.
$1,790 (£1,245 approx), lenovo.com
Razer’s concept laptop is not a laptop
at all. Instead, it’s a laptop-shaped
dock for the Razer Phone that sports
a 13.3-inch HD screen, a keyboard
and 200GB of storage. Processing is
handled by the phone, which slots
below the keyboard and doubles as a
trackpad and a second screen.
£TBC, razer.com
It may tip the scales at just 985g,
but the Asus ZenBook 13 is no
lightweight. It packs an Intel Core
i7 CPU, an Nvidia GeForce MX150
GPU, 16GB of RAM, 1TB of SSD
storage and a 4K UHD touchscreen.
Plus, Harman Kardon speakers make
it the perfect choice for music lovers.
£TBC, asus.com

4 CHEAP AND CHEERFUL 5 MAKE A NOTE 6 WATCH OUT, APPLE

With just 4GB of memory and 32GB
of storage, the latest addition to
Acer’s Chromebook range might
not be suitable for power users. But
it does offer 10 hours of battery life
for just £249, and will run Android
apps – making it a decent choice for
students when it lands in April.
£249, acer.com
Samsung’s new hybrid, the Notebook
9 Pen, features a 13.1-inch 1080p
display, 16GB of RAM, an Intel Core
i7 GPU and up to 512GB of SSD
storage. It has an S-Pen stylus, which
is great for arty types: think of it as a
halfway house between the Galaxy
Note 8 and a laptop.
£TBC, samsung.com
HP’s Spectre X360 15 laptop/
tablet now packs in Intel’s eighth-
generation quad-core chipset and a
Radeon RX Vega GPU, making this
a powerful beast for those who want
a rival to the MacBook Pro. Other
additions include a number pad and
a fingerprint sensor for security.
From £1,599 approx, hp.com

29
INNOVATIONS | CES REPORT 2018
HOME IMPROVEMENTS
Not long ago, ‘internet fridges’ were a
standing joke in tech circles. But
improvements in Internet of Things
(IoT) technology, coupled with the
unstoppable rise of digital assistants
like Siri, Alexa and Google Assistant
have changed that, and CES 2018 was
replete with all manner of devices
designed to help us live smarter.
These included – yes – an Alexa-
enabled fridge from LG (the InstaView
ThinQ, with its 29-inch touchscreen
display) and a Bixby-enabled one from
Samsung (the Family Hub 3.0). But
they also included the Toshiba Symbio,
a combined speaker, security camera
and home hub running Alexa; GE’s
MyLiFi lamp
Toshiba Symbio
Google plastered its ‘Hey Google’
phrase all over Las Vegas, to
advertise its voice assistant
30
Kitchen Hub, a range hood with a built-
in 27-inch display and camera; voice- GE’s voice-activated
ctivated
ceiling lights
activated ceiling lights (also from GE); Samsung’s Family Hub 3.0
a Philips 24-inch 7703 Android TV,
which is designed for use in the
kitchen and has Google Assistant
onboard; and perhaps most
intriguingly the MyLiFi lamp, which
offers a fast, secure, wireless internet
connection that uses light instead of
radio waves.
As with all things IoT, the usual
caveats about privacy and security
apply. But there can be little doubt that
domestic bliss is in the process of
getting considerably more high-tech.
DIGITAL ASSISTANTS
GO HEAD-TO-HEAD
Amazon’s Alexa is leading the digital assistant race right now, but
there’s no guarantee it’ll emerge as a final winner. As the
hardware on show at CES revealed, Google Assistant is making
serious inroads, and you can expect to see Google Assistant-
powered speakers from the likes of Bang & Olufsen, JBL and Altec
Lansing arriving in stores this year, as well as Google Assistant-
PHOTO: SHUTTERSTOCK
powered tablets, smartphones, TVs, washing machines and more.
Google isn’t hiding its intentions under a bushel, either: visitors
to CES were greeted by a giant, voice-activated Google gumball
machine that dished out prizes, while the city’s monorail was
given a Google makeover for the event.
 FEBRUARY 2018

STAYING ALIVE
*GCNVJCPFƂVPGUUJGCFKPI[QWTYC[KP

SUITED AND BOOTED

SMASHMOUTH
With concern growing about the dangers of concussion in contact
sports, particularly for kids, Prevent Biometrics has come up with this
Head Impact Monitoring System mouthguard. Four accelerometers
measure the force, location and direction of all head impacts, and
notify sideline personnel if there’s any cause for concern.
From $199 (£145 approx), preventbiometrics.com
DR DUCK
This is a children’s robot companion
with a difference. Built by meditech
R&D outfit Sproutel for health insurers
Aflac, My Special Duck is a therapeutic
aid for kids with cancer. As well
as music and games, it features a
‘catheter’ port so that youngsters
undergoing chemotherapy can re-
enact it with their fluffy friend, to help
them feel less scared by the process.
£N/A, sproutel.com
Designed for builders, agricultural labourers, rescue workers and so
on, this connected insole pairs with an app and will alert supervisors
if someone has a fall. It will also allow workers to monitor their
posture and fatigue, and count their steps. Sadly, though, for now it’s
only available on a wholesale basis to makers of safety footwear.
$149 (£108 approx), zhortech.com
HANDY GADGET
We’ve covered plenty of advances in
prosthetics in BBC Focus – but what if
your hand is simply paralysed, rather
than missing? Enter the Neomano
robotic glove, which is expected to
launch on Kickstarter later this year.
It can help patients with spinal cord
injuries carry out tasks like opening
doors, picking up a glass or brushing
their teeth.
£TBC, neofect.com
SUN SMART
Worried about your exposure to
ultraviolet rays? This tiny sensor
from L’Oréal, due to launch in
the summer, sits discreetly on
your thumbnail. It uses an NFC
connection to relay data on your
UV exposure to an Android/iOS
app, warning you when it’s time
to get out of the sunshine.
£TBC, loreal-paris.co.uk
m

BABY MAKER
This Mira fertility monitor from San Francisco’s Quanovate Inc pairs
with a smartphone app and – rather than just telling a woman if she’s
ovulating or not – uses AI to track and analyse her fertility over time, and
hence predict in advance when she’s most likely to be able to conceive.
£TBC, miracare.com

31
INNOVATIONS | CES REPORT 2018

BEST OF THE REST

Coming soon to a shop near you…

1 2 3

4 5 6

1 COOL RUNNING 2 SMART ART 3 DINKY DRONE

Forerunner 645 Music is the latest
addition to Garmin’s smartwatch
range. It can store up to 500 songs,
so runners can listen to music
without needing to take their
phone out with them. It also does
the usual fitness tracking stuff, and
there’s Garmin Pay onboard for
making contactless payments, too.
£400, garmin.com
The da Vinci 3D Pen Cool is the new
model of the company’s 3D-printing
pen. Now, the resulting models
aren’t as hot to the touch. It’s one of
several new 3D-printing products
from the company: there’s also the
tiny Nano printer and, for business
users, the $4,000 full-colour 3D/
inkjet printer AiO.
$45 (£33 approx), xyzprinting.com
Is it a wasp? Is it a bird? No, it’s a
microdrone! Uvify Oori fits in the
palm of your hand, but can roar along
at speeds of over 80km/h (50mph). Its
front-mounted camera streams first-
person footage back to the full colour
screen on the bundled handheld
controller, or to any compatible pair
of video goggles.
$389 (£282 approx), uvify.com

4 TUNE TRACKER 5 BYE BYE, POWERPOINT 6 BOTTOMS UP

You’ll struggle to lose these
Soundsport wireless headphones
from Bose. As well as a neckband
and over-ear loops, the Bluetooth
in-ears have Tile’s tracking tech
built in, so if you do misplace
them, just fire up the Tile app on
your phone and it’ll give you their
last location.
£149, bose.co.uk
Want to jazz up your business
presentations? Perhaps it’d be worth
investing in Samsung Flip, a 55-
inch, 4K electronic whiteboard that
connects to digital devices either
wirelessly or via USB, then lets up to
four users write, scribble or draw over
the top. The board can be used in
either landscape or portrait.
£TBC, samsung.com
It’s important to let red wine breathe,
but the wait between opening and
pouring can be frustrating. This
rapid aerator, from French company
Aveine, will provide up to 24 hours
of ‘breathing’ instantly. Plus, if you
scan the label on your wine, the
accompanying app will tell you its
optimum breathing time. Cheers!
$200 (£145), aveine.paris

32
DROID INVENTOR KIT
TM

Kids can create their own custom Droid™ and bring it to

life using littleBits electronic blocks! With the free Droid
Inventor app, they’ll give their R2 Unit new abilities and take
it on 16+ missions. Then they’ll level-up their inventor skills,
reconfiguring parts to design any Droid they can dream up.

Available in

Red alert for the Sumatran tiger. Fauna & Flora International seeks action in response to severe
threat from poachers. 5 March deadline.
Photo: Brian McKay
350 Sumatran tigers remain - down from 500.
Urgent support needed for action plan.
We must act now to save them.
This Critically Endangered tiger has been pushed to
the edge of extinction – 350 or fewer remain. Give to
stop the poachers at www.FFIsumatrantiger.org
Latest figures just released show 350 Sumatran
tigers remain - down from 500. The figures, from the
Sumatran Ministry of Forestry, show how the ruthless
assault from poachers is pushing this magnificent
creature right to the edge of extinction.
Fauna & Flora International (FFI) has put out an
urgent call to the global community to save the last
Sumatran tigers currently existing in the wild – and
specifically to employ more rangers.
FFI is urgently seeking funds to step up their crucial
conservation programme in Kerinci Seblat National
Park, Sumatra, Indonesia. In order to safeguard the
Photo: Gill Shaw
future existence of these magnificent creatures, it is vital
that more rangers are employed.
Right now, the Sumatran tiger faces a number
of very serious threats, which are putting their very
survival in jeopardy. And, sadly, they are all man-
made.
Poaching activity has reached unprecedented
levels. Hunters make good money from the tiger’s
beautiful skin and demand is constantly growing. FFI’s
investigations show that there is a huge demand for
tiger bone, which is used in traditional Asian medicines,
and black market prices make this grisly trade all too
profitable.
These grave threats have been exacerbated by a very
serious loss of habitat. In the last ten to 15 years, natural
forest cover in Sumatra has been slashed by almost a
staggering 40%.
With such a dramatic loss of habitat, these majestic
forest dwellers are struggling to survive and have
been designated as Critically Endangered on the
IUCN Red List, making the Sumatran tiger one of the
most endangered tiger subspecies on the planet. This
is a rating reserved for animals that face an extremely
high risk of extinction in the wild.
Latest surveys have indicated that there may now be
as few as 350 Sumatran tigers existing in the wild.
Thanks to the vital work of FFI’s Tiger Protection and
Photo: Debbie Martyr/FFI
Conservation Programme, the numbers have stabilised
in the Kerinci Seblat National Park, but the species is
still under severe threat.
The illegal poaching syndicates are ruthless and will
stop at nothing to supply the market. Other poachers are
also in the area, sabotaging FFI’s conservation work. In
2016, bird poachers vandalised 16 camera traps set by
the tiger conservation team, which meant vital evidence
was lost.
This is an ongoing battle, but it is one we must win.
Debbie Martyr, FFI Team Leader of the Kerinci Tiger
Project in Sumatra, says:
“Ranger teams walked almost 1,100 miles on forest
patrols in and bordering the national park and destroyed
more than 16 active tiger snares. That is why we need to
step up patrol regimes”.
Tiger populations are dreadfully fragile.
The signs suggest that FFI’s approach is working, as
patrols are reporting more evidence of tigers. Yet if FFI
cannot recruit more rangers to protect the tigers against
the increased efforts of the poachers, then all our good
work could be undone.
Advertisement
• £83,131 is needed to help us fund more rangers and step up action against the
poachers in Kerinci Seblat National Park.
• This is one of the final strongholds of the incredibly rare Sumatran tiger.
• FFI’s work here could be all that stands between the Sumatran tiger and extinction.
That’s why it’s absolutely vital that we increase our
patrols to protect tigers from poachers – and work
towards greater protection for their delicate habitat.
If we’re going to save the Critically Endangered
Sumatran tiger from complete extinction, it’s crucial
that we have the means to take action now.
FFI must raise £83,131. To do that, the charity is
asking you to make an urgent contribution today.
Please send a gift, by no later than 5 March to help
safeguard the future survival of the last few remaining
wild Sumatran tigers.
“If you value the natural world – if you think it should be
protected for its own sake as well as humanity’s – then
please support Fauna & Flora International.”
Sir David Attenborough
Fauna & Flora International vice-president
Together, we can save the Sumatran tiger from
extinction – but only if we take action immediately.
To take action for the Sumatran tiger please go to
www.FFIsumatrantiger.org or cut the coupon.
If the coupon to the bottom right is missing, please
send your cheque (payable to FFI) to: Freepost FAUNA
& FLORA INTERNATIONAL by 5 March at the very
latest.
FFI is driving down wildlife crime, and in conjunction with
local police, is successfully investigating and arresting
wildlife criminals. Your support today can help stop the
senseless killing of Sumatran tigers and their cubs.
Fauna & Flora International, founded in 1903, was the
world’s first international conservation organisation.
Today its work spans the globe, with over 150 projects
in more than 50 countries. It has a strong history of
finding creative solutions to conservation problems and
of working with local communities. FFI is supported
by the most eminent scientists and members of the
conservation movement.
Fauna & Flora International (FFI) has launched an
emergency appeal, backed by Sir David Attenborough,
to raise £83,131 to help save the Sumatran tiger.
These items are vital to help save the remaining
Sumatran tigers from extinction.
£6,500 could buy a replacement 4WD jeep to transport
rangers to distant patrol sites - our current vehicle has
severe engine problems.
£3,000 could help get two extra rangers into the field to
prevent poaching.
£400 could buy camping equipment or boots for 28
rangers.
£72 could buy first aid kits to treat injured rangers whilst
out on patrol.
£32 could help buy charging units for telephones;
essential
to getting extra help if poachers are spotted.
Donations large or small will help us save the Critically
Endangered Sumatran tiger from illegal poaching
syndicates.
Cut the coupon below and return it to FFI,
together with your gift, to help save the Critically
Endangered Sumatran tiger. Alternatively, go to
www.FFIsumatrantiger.org. Thank you.
I want to help save the remaining 350 Sumatran
tigers today, with a donation of £________
I enclose a cheque payable to Fauna & Flora International
OR I wish to pay by credit/debit card
Card No:
Expiry Date: Security code:
Issue Number: (Maestro only)
Title Forename
Surname
Address
Postcode
Please email the latest updates, appeals and events to me at:
See the difference you have made
To show how your support has helped, we will keep you
informed on the progress of this project and our other work
around the world to protect endangered species by mail. We
will also send you carefully selected projects where your support
could make a difference. If you don’t want this information please
tick the box below.
Please don’t contact me by post
We keep your personal details secure and never sell, trade
or rent them out.
See full details at www.fauna-flora.org/privacy
Please return to: Freepost FAUNA & FLORA INTERNATIONAL
The David Attenborough Building, Pembroke St, Cambridge CB2 3QZ
or go to www.FFIsumatrantiger.org to donate online now.
PR-ST18BF
Please note: If Fauna & Flora International succeeds in raising more than
£83,131 from this appeal, funds will be used wherever they are most needed
Registered Charity Number 1011102 Registered Company No. 267706.
 ‘
DON’T
WORRY,
BE HAPPY
MEET THE SCIENTISTS WHOSE
RESEARCH MIGHT JUST SAVE
THE WORLD
WORDS: HAYLEY BENNETT, DUNCAN GEERE,
HELEN PILCHER AND ANDY RIDGWAY
ILLUSTRATION: MARIO WAGNER

37
60
PHOTOS: RESTART LIFE LLC X4
 THE
NEW HERBALIST
Superbugs are becoming more resistant to antibiotics by the day.
Cassandra Quave is searching for a solution in forgotten herbal remedies

R
oaming around southern Italy, picking Staphylococcus aureus, more commonly known as MRSA.
up interesting plants and having a chat Quave has something of a personal vendetta against the
with the locals might sound like a holiday, ‘staph’ bug: at the age of three, she was hospitalised for
but ethnobotanist Dr Cassandra Quave months with an MRSA infection after having part of her
assures us it’s not. “You know, it’s not a right leg amputated. Later, she got involved with science
vacation,” she says. “It’s really hard work.” fair projects and became completely absorbed in the idea of
It’s also vital work – Quave and her team bacterial resistance via news stories about E. coli-infested
from Emory University in Atlanta, Georgia, are scouring burgers. “I was an odd kid!” she jokes. MRSA is notorious as
the Mediterranean for medicines that could help tackle the hospital ‘superbug’ that causes dangerous skin infections
the mounting crisis of antibiotic resistance. In the US and by using wounds, burns, drips and catheters to gain access
Europe alone, 50,000 people die each year from infections to deeper layers of the skin. Quave regularly receives letters
caused by resistant bacteria they and emails from patients’ frightened
picked up during a hospital stay. relatives, who are desperate to try
Without new treatments, global
deaths will soon soar into the
“Over time any new treatment for the disease.
It’s a constant reminder that her
millions. Quave believes that those
treatments can be found in plants. and within ultimate goal is helping people, not
making the next blockbuster drug.
A self-described histor y of
medicine geek, Quave talks to these cultures, So has Quave found anything on
her Italian field trips that could help
local people about plants that have those individuals suffering from
been used, often for centuries, in
their traditional medicines. In
they’ve become life-threatening skin infections?
“In Italy, we asked people ‘what
this way, she hopes to track down
those with the greatest potential
attuned to these plants do you put on the skin to treat
infections, rashes... all of these kinds
for fighting infection. She admits
other researchers looking for new
plant compounds of things’,” she says. “And sweet
chestnut came up.” Yes, the exact
antibiotics are dismissive about her
and to the resolution same plant that gives us roasted
PHOTO: DAMON CASAREZ /REDUX PICTURES ILLUSTRATION: MARIO WAGNER

approach because they think plants chestnuts at Christmas. In a recent

have already been found lacking.
“But no one has looked at the scope of disease, and
of plants that we’re looking at, and
some of these are [already] being I think that’s
used in traditional medicines for
fighting infection,” says Quave.
“Also, no one has looked at the
exciting”
other potential ways that these
might be acting beyond just killing bugs.” What’s curious
about some of the plant extracts that Quave has tested is
that they work in a different way to the antibiotics used in
clinics today. As they stop short of killing their targets –
working instead against microbial communication systems
– the bugs shouldn’t evolve resistance to these extracts,
making them an exciting prospect for future antibiotics.
The approach could work against different species of
bacteria, but top of Quave’s hit list is methicillin-resistant
paper, Quave’s team showed that
sweet chestnut leaf extract can
block some of the toxic effects of
MRSA and, in a mouse infected
with the bug, decrease the area of
skin affected, all without killing the
bacteria. They’ve now narrowed it
down to five compounds that seem
to be responsible for most of the benefit.
Quave, who practises what she preaches, making medicinal
teas from plants she grows in her own garden, also hopes
to validate some age-old remedies. “This is giving cultural
value to people who have been using these remedies for
centuries. Perhaps a healer doesn’t understand the intricacies
of bacterial signalling, but over time and within these
cultures, they’ve become attuned to these plant compounds
and to the resolution of disease, and I think that’s exciting.”

39
COVER STORY

Q&A

CASSANDRA
QUAVE
What motivates you?
The excitement of every moment
of discovery. Also, the letters I get
from patients and the interactions
I have with my students really keep
me motivated.

Have you ever had moments when you felt

like giving up?
Yes. The constant failure and
rejection, especially for funding, can
really wear on you. Everyone sees
your successes but they don’t know
about the 5 to 10 failures behind
every success.

What’s your response to people who say

your project won’t work?
Well, first and foremost I try to listen
to them – I’m always open to ideas
ABOVE: MRSA and feedback – but I don’t let
bacteria (pink
spheres) are unnecessarily dismissive comments
PHOTOS: GETTY X3, SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY, JARROD J SCOTT ILLUSTRATION: ACUTE GRAPHICS

resistant to stop my work.

many common
antibiotics,
making an If you were able to rent out a billboard in
infection hard Times Square, what would you write on it?
to treat
‘Stop habitat destruction, and support
LEFT: Extracts preservation of biodiversity and
from sweet cultural diversity.’ That doesn’t make
chestnut can
block the a very sexy headline, but that would
effects of MRSA be my main message to the public.

What will your field of research look

like in 2050?
I envision a new era of medicine in
which we approach drug-resistant
infections in a whole new way.
Advances in our understanding of
how synergistic therapies work will
enable us to design better medicines
that quickly reduce the severity of
disease and achieve cures even
for difficult-to-treat, antibiotic-
resistant infections.

40
 H OW I T WORKS
QUORUM SENSING
When bacteria sense that their numbers
have reached a critical threshold, they
switch on the production of substances QUORUM-SENSING
that attack their human host. Cassandra MOLECULE
HARMFUL
Quave is looking for drugs that interrupt SUBSTANCES
this process. BACTERIUM

1 Bacteria can’t talk but they can use chemicals to communicate.

Bacterial ‘quorum-sensing’ molecules attach to receptors in
bacteria’s outer membranes, helping them sense their neighbours.
The more bacteria there are, the higher the concentration of
quorum-sensing molecules and the more of them each bacterium
comes into contact with. RECEPTORS

PLANT
EXTRACT BACTERIUM

HARMFUL
SUBSTANCES

2 Once the bacteria have reached certain levels, they start releasing
harmful substances. But certain compounds produced by plants, like
extracts of sweet chestnut and Brazilian peppertree, may be able to
3 Unlike the antibiotics in use today, the plant
prevent this by interfering with the bacterial quorum-sensing
system. If the bacteria don’t detect quorum-sensing molecules, they products don’t seem to have much effect on bacterial
are essentially deaf to their neighbours and aren’t able to coordinate growth and don’t kill them off – they simply stop the
an attack. We’re still not sure how these plant extracts exert the conversation. This could prevent the bacteria from
effect – they may prevent the bacteria making the quorum-sensing becoming resistant, as there is less pressure for them
molecules in the first place, or stop them releasing or receiving them. to evolve new survival strategies.

ALTE R NATIVE M E D I C I N ES

1 FUNGUS-FARMING ANTS 2 CATFISH MUCUS 3 THE ENDS OF THE EARTH

Leafcutter ants keep fungi gardens. They
cut leaves to feed to the fungi, which will
in turn feed the ants’ larvae. This fungi
‘farming’ attracts lots of unwanted
microbes, but the ants combat the bugs
with antimicrobials produced by
Actinomycete bacteria that grow on their
own bodies – a potential source of new
drugs being studied at the University of
East Anglia. Most antibiotics used today
come from the same group of bacteria.
The striped dwarf catfish, found in Asian
estuaries, may look unremarkable, but it
secretes an antibiotic-filled mucus from
its skin. Actually, many fish produce
mucus that’s rich in antimicrobials,
because it helps protect them from
disease. However, Indian researchers
found that slime from the catfish was
particularly potent against bugs that
infect humans, including Pseudomonas
aeruginosa , which causes pneumonia.
Scientists from the University of Illinois,
Chicago, are searching in places that until
recently remained unexplored for
antibiotics. They plunge their test tubes
into Iceland’s hot springs and the muck at
the bottom of freshwater lakes, to look
for bacteria that produce novel
compounds. They’ve already found
bacteria in Lake Michigan that produce
antibiotics capable of killing the
tuberculosis bug.

41
60
PHOTOS: RESTART LIFE LLC X4
 THE
PLANT WHISPERER
A famine crisis is looming. Stephen Long’s work aims to feed
the masses by supercharging the plants we eat
I
n the middle of the 20th Century, many parts of
the world were on the brink of famine. A growing
global population was butting up against the limits
of food supply, with disastrous consequences. But
the lives of more than a billion people were saved
by a ‘Green Revolution’ – the spread of techniques
like irrigation, hybridised seeds, and human-made
fertilisers and pesticides from industrialised countries to
the developing world.
Today, we’re facing a similar crisis. “The UN Food and
Agriculture Organization says that we’re going to need 70 per
cent more food by 2050, and with
current rates of crop improvement
we’re not going to get there,” says
Stephen Long, director of The RIPE
“The UN Food
Project, which aims to spur a second
Green Revolution by engineering and Agriculture
crops so that they’re able to
photosynthesise more efficiently. Organization says
“Photosynthesis is the process
that converts sunlight energy and
carbon dioxide into the substance of
that we’re going to
a plant, so it’s basically the source,
directly or indirectly, of all of our
need 70 per cent
food. We know that in crop plants
this process is not actually very
more food by 2050.
efficient, and we now understand
enough about the process that we With current rates of
can start to intervene and genetically
improve its efficiency.” crop improvement
Historically, prevailing wisdom
we’re not going to
PHOTO: THE RIPE PROJECT ILLUSTRATION: MARIO WAGNER
has always been that photosynthesis
couldn’t be made more efficient.
After all, why would evolution have
not optimised such an important
get there”
process? But Long points out that
evolution optimises for survival and reproduction, not
maximum output of the seeds and fruits that humans eat.
Meanwhile, we’re living in a different environment from
the time of the first Green Revolution. “A major molecule
involved in photosynthesis is carbon dioxide, and in the
last 50 years, through our activities, we’ve increased the
concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere by 25
per cent. That is a very short time for evolution to adapt to
a change,” says Long.
So, he and his team set to work proving that it was possible
to boost the efficiency of photosynthesis. With funding from
the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, they started tinkering
with tobacco – a plant that’s relatively easy to engineer. To
begin with, his team transferred genes from Arabidopsis
thaliana, better known as thale cress, to the tobacco plant in
the hope of helping it shed heat energy more efficiently. When
three variants of these engineered plants were grown, their
yields were 13.5 per cent, 19 per cent and 20 per cent greater
than normal tobacco plants grown as a comparison. “Although
we understand photosynthesis now in plants in great detail,
it is a complex process. It’s over 160
discrete steps. The first part of the
project was actually simulating the
whole thing on a computer. We could
then try billions of manipulations,
mathematically, to then see where
might be the best places to intervene.”
What’s more, these impressive
gains were achieved with minimal
increases in resource costs. The
engineered plants required about
1 to 2 per cent more nitrogen than the
unmodified plants, and no increase
in water use. “That is really the
beauty of improving photosynthetic
efficiency,” says Long. “It’s not only
the efficiency with which they use
light, but it’s also the efficiency with
which they use water and nitrogen.
So in most cases, we are getting more
productivity for the same amount
of water, and minimal increases
in nitrogen.”
The big question is whether these
gains in tobacco can be transferred
to food crops, and there’s reason to believe that they can.
Photosynthesis works in the same way in tobacco as it does
in many food crops, and tests are planned to see if similar
modifications can deliver increases in yields of staples like
rice, cowpeas and cassava. The potential is enormous, but
the clock’s ticking. “Any innovation we have today is going
to take about 20 years to be available to farmers at the scale
we need,” says Long. “So while 2050 might sound a long way
off, in terms of improving crop productivity it’s quite close.”
43
IN FOCUS
COVER STORY
| HEALTH

Q&A

STEPHEN
LONG
What keeps you feeling optimistic?
Last year the first of these
manipulations gave us a 20 per cent
boost in productivity. Breeders are
usually happy if they can get 1 per
cent. So that really showed that we
were onto something. This year, two of
my colleagues working on different
ways of improving photosynthesis had
major successes in their field trials.

Have you ever had moments when you

felt like giving up?
I’ve certainly had moments where I’ve
felt like giving up. For a long time,
there was a very strong belief that the
process of photosynthesis couldn’t be
improved in crops because evolution
couldn’t possibly have left a free lunch
on the table.

ABOVE: What’s your response to people who say

PHOTOS: THE RIPE PROJECT, SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY X2, GETTY X2 ILLUSTRATION: ACUTE GRAPHICS

Engineered
seedlings are your project won’t work?
transplanted My response is that we now have very
into a field
as part of The
strong evidence from replicated field
RIPE Project trials that it is working.
LEFT: A stoma
on a tobacco If you were able to rent out a billboard in
leaf. These tiny Times Square, what would you write on it?
pores regulate ‘Don’t be complacent about our global
the exchange of
gases between food supply – it’s at serious risk.’
the atmosphere
and a leaf’s
interior. When
What will your field of research look
it’s dark or like in 2050?
during times of I think the genetic tools that have been
drought, they
close up so the developed over the last 20 to 30 years
plants don’t will be being deployed at scale. So,
lose water we’ll have smart crops able to deal
with different environments, and be
far more sustainable. That’s what the
technology is going to allow us.
Whether we accept that technology is
going to be another issue.

44
H OW I T WORKS
T U R B O C H A RG I N G
P H OTO SY NT H E S I S
All plant cells have DNA, which contains
genetic material. There are three ways
that genes are being used to increase
yields of crops.
METHOD 2
= 1 Crops have natural variation. Scientists can
+ selectively breed parent plants to ensure that
1 If a plant already has a particular
desirable gene, then extra copies of the
gene can be added to the plant’s DNA
to improve it even further.
1 ZYGO BEETLE
In South Africa, farmers have learned to
fear the plant Parthenium hysterophorus.
It uses natural herbicides to prevent other
plants growing near it, causing havoc
when it lands in farmers’ fields. But since
2003, the country has been employing
the weed’s natural enemy – the Zygo
beetle – to reduce its spread. Researchers
at Wits University hope the beetle can
establish itself throughout problematic
regions and curb the weed’s growth.
METHOD 1
1 A specific gene that can
improve metabolic pathways
is snipped out from another
organism (blue).
METHOD 3
desirable traits are expressed in their offspring.
+ =
FA M I N E F I G H T E R S
2 CRISPR/Cas9
Since the discovery of CRISPR/Cas9, a
powerful tool for genetic editing,
researchers have started figuring out ways
to use it to boost crop yields. Geneticists at
the Chinese Academy of Sciences, for
example, have discovered how to
restructure wheat genes to make the crops
immune to powdery mildew, while
researchers at King Abdullah University of
Science and Technology gave tomatoes
immunity against the yellow leaf curl virus.
2 The gene is inserted into
the plant’s DNA, so the plant
will become more efficient.
3 SATELLITE DATA
It’s far easier to fight a famine when you
know that it’s coming, so a team from
the US Geological Survey has designed a
system that uses satellite data to
detect the unusual spikes in land
temperature that often cause crop
failure. During its testing phase in
Ethiopia, the project was able to provide
several weeks more lead time to act
before families had begun to go hungry
and animals had started to die.
45
60
PHOTOS: RESTART LIFE LLC X4
 THE
CORAL MATCHMAKER
We’re in the midst of a mass extinction event. Jamie Craggs
hopes his research could save coral reefs from this fate
I
t’s not a good time to be a wild animal or plant.
Extinction rates are soaring. Every day, up to
100 species are lost forever, and it’s estimated
that around 25,000 species are teetering on
the edge of oblivion. We live in a time of mass
extinction, and nowhere is safe. In the oceans,
it’s thought that 60 per cent of the world’s coral
reefs could die over the next 20 years.
It’s not all bad news, however. Species can, and have,
been rescued from the brink of extinction, and sometimes
their saviours can be found in the most unexpected of
places, like the bowels of a south
London museum. Jamie Craggs, the
aquarium curator at the Horniman
Museum and Gardens, is brimming
“Sure enough, at
with excitement because, very
soon, the mini coral reefs he has so 1pm, the spectacle
lovingly created will explode with
potential new life. It’s the result begins. In darkened
of five years’ hard graft, working
out the exact conditions needed to
make captive coral spawn.
tanks, thousands of
In the wild, corals like the ones
Craggs is working on reproduce
tiny pink spheres,
once a year, all on the same night
and at the same time. The process,
each no larger than
called synchronous spawning,
sees coral colonies release clouds a sugar granule,
of sperm a nd eggs into t he
water, where they are mingled are released by the
and dispersed by the waves and
cur rents. It’s a n evolutiona r y coral and float to
PHOTO: SOPHIA SPRING ILLUSTRATION: MARIO WAGNER
adaptation that enables the sex
cells of distant coral colonies to
meet and mix, minimising the
the surface”
risk of inbreeding.
Inside coral cells are algae-like organisms called symbiotic
zooxanthellae, which give them energy and colour. But
rising sea temperatures are causing the zooxanthellae to
desert the corals, leaving them bleached and susceptible
to disease. The survivors find themselves so isolated that
successful sexual reproduction is becoming difficult.
As part of his PhD at the University of Derby, Craggs
has devised a closed tank system that mimics the natural
environment of corals. By controlling the type and duration
of light, along with nutrient levels, water chemistry and
temperature, he can reliably and predictably induce coral
spawning to within half an hour. “It’s a game changer,” he
says. “No one else has ever been able to do that before.”
When the spectacle begins, thousands of tiny pink
spheres, each no larger than a sugar granule, are released
by the coral and f loat to the surface of their darkened
tanks. These particular corals are hermaphrodites, so each
package contains both eggs and sperm. In a UK first, Craggs
and his colleagues have used them for in vitro fertilisation
(IVF), yielding new coral young. “The potential is huge,”
Craggs says. “We can now make
the coral in our collection spawn
four or five times a year.” The only
limiting factors are the number of
tanks and the amount of time that
Craggs and his team have.
As the young corals grow and form
new colonies, they provide an ever-
expanding resource for scientific
study. In the wild, some corals are
naturally more resistant to rising
temperatures, disease and pollution.
With his new system, Craggs has
the perfect setup to identify the
features that endow these stoical
individuals with their resilient
nature. He can model how different
corals a re likely to respond to
future environmental change, and
critically, he hopes to breed specific
individuals together to boost levels
of genetic diversity, producing robust
corals that are more likely to survive.
For ethical and practical reasons,
Craggs’s corals will never be
expor ted, so last yea r, t he museum tea med up wit h
The Florida Aquarium’s Centre for Conservation. Using
technology f rom t he Horniman Museum’s Project
Coral, the aquarium plans to breed hardy native coral
that will be used to directly restock the depleted Florida
Reef Tract. After that, who knows? There’s no reason why
the same techniques can’t be rolled out to other ailing
reefs, giving the world’s coral and the myriad creatures that
depend on it the chance of a brighter, more colourful future.
47
IN FOCUS
COVER STORY
| HEALTH

Q&A

JAMIE
CRAGGS
What keeps you feeling optimistic?
I think there are pockets of hope.
There are some highly resilient corals
out there that seem to do well despite
challenging environmental
conditions, and there are also still
some pristine reefs left.

Have you ever had moments when you

felt like giving up?
One time, early on, I missed the coral
spawning because I thought it wasn’t
going to happen and I went home. It
was absolutely heartbreaking, but it
made me realise that we needed to
control the spawning, and led to the
setup we have today.

What’s your response to people who say

ABOVE: that your project won’t work?
Resembling a
starry night I think they just need to come down
sky, spawn and spend some time with us and see
from a colony
of coral is
what we’ve achieved. What we’re
released in the developing here is going to underpin
Cayman Islands and support lots of other great,
LEFT: These positive work.
corals in North
Sulawesi have If you could have a billboard in Piccadilly
bleached in
PHOTOS: ALAMY X2, GETTY X3 ILLUSTRATION: ACUTE GRAPHICS

response Circus, what would you write on it?

to a rise in sea A picture tells a thousand words, so
temperature
I’d put up photos of coral reefs: the
colourful, healthy, vibrant ones
full of fish and then the bleached,
damaged, empty, dying ones… before
and after shots.

What will your field of research look

like in 2050?
In much the same way that people
grow trees in nurseries today, I think
we’ll find coral being grown in land-
based nurseries on a large scale, and
then used to restock the reefs.

48
 HOW I T WORKS
CO R A L I V F
5 Eggs and sperm are physically separated.
With the right conditions, some coral
species can be induced to spawn in the lab.
SPERM EGGS

6 The sex cells from one

colony (black cu
ups) are mixed
with those fromm an
unrelated, genettically distinct
colony (blue cup
ps).

FERTILISATION EAR
RLY 6 Once e the eggs are
PLANULA
EMBRYO
Y TIC fertilised
d, the cells will
DEVELO
OPMENT start divviding to
create an embryo.
Each em mbryo will
eventuaally become a
larva callled a planula.
1 Reef-building 3 Spawning can be predicted
Acroporaa coral can be
A and lasts for just 15 minutes.
in
nduced to spawn in The bundles are scooped out 7 PPlanulae are
taanks. They release of the water in a cup. transsferred into a
b
bundles of sperm and settlement tank.
eggs, which float to the Theyy sink and
surface of the water. attacch to specially
preppared tiles
where they begin
to grrow into coral
4 The mixture is stirred
polyyps with
2 Each bundle and the bundles break mou uths and
contains around apart. The lipid-rich tentaacles. A few
10
0 eggs and eggs float on the weeks later,
th
housands surface, whilst the zooxxanthellae are
o sperm.
of sperm sink, swim and addeed to the tank,
turn the water milky. whicch the corals
incorporate into
theirr cells.

SAVE O U R S PECI
PEC I ES

1 THE FROZEN ZOO 2 GENETIC MODIFICATION 3 GENOME LIBRARIES

At San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation
Research, scientists have created a ‘frozen
zoo’ of cells and embryos from endangered
and extinct species. As the largest, most
diverse collection of its kind, the initiative
seeks to preserve the world’s biodiversity
in cellular form, and provide material for
research and conservation projects.
Attempts to rescue the northern white
rhino, of which there are just three left,
focus on sperm samples stored at the zoo.
The endangered black-footed ferret could
become the first wild animal to have its
DNA deliberately altered. The species
suffers from inbreeding and sylvatic
plague, which threaten its existence.
Scientists from Revive & Restore, a US
non-profit organisation pioneering the use
of genetics in conservation, want to edit its
genome to make it disease-resistant, and
clone ferrets from the cells of dead
individuals to restore genetic diversity.
The kākāpō is a flightless parrot endemic
to New Zealand. Decimated by invasive
species, the 151 birds alive today are the
focus of a conservation programme. They
live on predator-free islands, where they
are monitored and breeding is managed.
Some birds are artificially inseminated,
and chicks are sometimes fostered by
experienced kākāpō mothers. The genome
of every living kākāpō is being decoded in
an effort to guide future conservation.

49
60
PHOTOS: RESTART LIFE LLC X4
 THE
CLOUD CHASER
+HYGNGCTPJQYVQKPƃWGPEGVJGYGCVJGTclimate change could be slowed.
Anna Possner KUETWPEJKPIVJGPWODGTUVQƂPFQWVYJCVVJGEQPUGSWGPEGUOKIJVDG
W
e see them almost every day, but
there’s a lot we don’t know about
clouds. Even to meteorologists, their
inner workings are somewhat hazy.
And that matters, because clouds
play an important role in regulating
the planet’s temperature – both
reflecting radiation from the Sun and acting like a blanket,
keeping the Earth’s heat in. In fact, some clouds are so
effective at the reflecting bit that ‘supercharging’ them by
making them even brighter and whiter has been suggested
as a way to reduce temperatures and fight global warming.
It’s an idea that atmospheric scientist Anna Possner is very
familiar with. Her research at the
Carnegie Institution for Science
in Stanford, California, will help
to answer the question of whether
“Could spraying tiny
‘cloud brightening’ might actually
work. She’s part of the Marine Cloud droplets of seawater
Brightening Project, an initiative
that’s brought together cloud experts into clouds brighten
in the US and UK with a bunch of
retired Silicon Valley engineers
to find out whether spraying tiny
them enough to cool
droplets of seawater into clouds
can brighten them enough to cool
the planet – without
the planet – and do so without any
nasty side effects?”
PHOTO: CARNEGIE INSTITUTION FOR SCIENCE ILLUSTRATION: MARIO WAGNER
nasty side effects.
Possner runs experiments with
clouds, looking to see what happens
when she injects droplets of seawater into them. But the
clouds Possner works with are made up of numbers – they
are numerical representations of the real thing created using
algorithms that model how atmospheric systems work. So
complex are these models that they require supercomputers
– such as those at the National Center for Atmospheric
Research’s (NCAR) centre in Wyoming – to run. “You run
your models and you get output files that are usually four-
dimensional – time and 3D space of various fields such as
temperature, pressure, cloud water and cloud reflectivity,”
says Possner.
Now a postdoctoral research scientist at Carnegie, it was
Possner’s research for her PhD at ETH Zurich, Switzerland,
that led to her connection with cloud brightening. Here she
studied ship tracks, which are the shipping equivalent of
aircraft contrails. These slender strips of brightened cloud
form as ships crossing oceans belch out tiny aerosols, such
as sulphate particles, from their smoke stacks. It’s around
these tiny particles that water vapour in the atmosphere
condenses, making the clouds more reflective. It’s exactly the
same principle behind cloud brightening, except the particles
that would supercharge the clouds would be saltwater.
Cloud brightening, like most geoengineering projects, is
controversial. The biggest concern being that meddling with
our weather systems might have unforeseen knock-on effects,
and could actually make things worse. This controversy
makes funding for such research hard to come by. It also
makes young atmospheric scientists like 30-year-old Possner
tentative about getting involved.
“I’m not saying I’m in support or
against it really, we have just got to
start this now in terms of research.
This is an idea that’s out there,
and if people expect the scientific
community to make a qualified
statement about the possibilities and
limitations of this method, it requires
coordinated research.”
Possner’s virtual clouds are helping
to plan the next stage of the project –
where seawater will be sprayed into
real clouds, rather than numerical
ones, to measure what happens. At
first, the plan is to run experiments
on land at Moss Landing on the
Californian coast before starting trials out at sea. Exactly
when these experiments will happen is dependent on funding.
“If you want to see whether this will work, you’ve got to test
it in the field,” says Possner. “That’s where marine cloud
brightening has a benefit – you can test it in the small scale
without it having a long-term impact. Sea salt sediments out
of the atmosphere quickly, and you’re not spraying anything
that isn’t there already.”
For Possner, the big draw of cloud brightening research is
understanding the basic physical process of how microscopic
particles, such as sea salt and dust, interact with the atmosphere
to generate and grow clouds. These aerosol-cloud interactions,
as they are known, are one of the biggest unknowns in
climate science, and figuring them out will give scientists
a much better idea of what’s in store for our fragile planet.
51
COVER STORY

Q&A

ANNA
POSSNER
What motivates you?
The role of clouds in a changing climate is
something we’ve not fully understood for
decades. Now we are at a stage where we
have computational capabilities and
planned experimental initiatives, like the
cloud brightening project, with which we
can hope to really make headway.

Have you ever had moments when you

felt like giving up?
Doing research sometimes feels like
living on a rollercoaster. Sometimes you
do not make headway for months, which
can be immensely frustrating. However,
it’s then even more rewarding when you
have a breakthrough.

What’s your response to people who say

that your project won’t work?
We don’t know whether marine cloud
brightening will work, but this project
offers us an opportunity to run
experiments and collect valuable data,
ABOVE: The not just for the cloud brightening project
tracks in these
but for understanding aerosol-cloud
PHOTOS: ALAMY, JOHN MACNEILL, GEORGIA INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY, SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY

clouds are
caused by tiny interactions in general.
particles that
have been
released from Where do you see the planet in 30 years?
ships. Water I’d like to see a really consolidated effort
vapour
condenses to move from fossil fuels to low carbon
around the alternatives that are economically
particles, competitive, and I’d also like to see more
making the
clouds brighter hybrid cars on the road, if not electric.
LEFT: Concept
of a yacht that
What will your field of research look
would spray like in 2050?
seawater into It’s a really exciting time in climate
clouds to make
them brighter modelling. We’ve started moving away
from modelling individual regions over
short time periods. In the future, we’ll be
able to model the entire Earth at
kilometre, or even sub-kilometre,
resolution [the distance between the data
points within the model] over long
periods, which will hugely improve the
accuracy of our climate predictions.

52
 H OW I T WORKS Stratocumulus clouds have been identified as the best form of
C LO U D B R I G H T E N I N G cloud to be brightened. These low clouds extend over huge
areas, so offer a much better prospect of affecting temperature
than tiny pockets of wispy clouds. And unlike higher clouds,
Clouds sprayed with they also allow a relatively high proportion of the longwave
seawater reflect more radiation reflected from the Earth’s surface to pass through
sunlight, which could help them – they trap little heat beneath them, in other words.
reduce the planet’s
temperature.

3 A higher proportion of
shortwave radiation from
the Sun is reflected by the
clouds that have been
brightened. This reduces
temperatures at the sea
surface.
LONGWAVE
2 When the seawater RADIATION
particles reach the clouds,
water vapour condenses
around them. The water
droplets they form in the
clouds are small, resulting in
more scattering of incoming
light because there are
more surfaces for the light
to reflect off. Cloud brightening is most likely to take
place out at sea. This is because marine
clouds tend to have a low reflectivity,
1 Nozzles on board a giving plenty of scope to boost their
ship pump tiny particles reflectivity by injecting them with
of seawater into the air. seawater droplets.
The nozzle already
developed by Marine
Cloud Brightening Project
engineers is capable of
generating three trillion
particles a second.

C LI M ATE CO N D ITI O N E RS

1 SUPERCHARGE THE STRATOSPHERE 2 OCEAN SEEDING 3 SPACE REFLECTORS

Instead of making clouds brighter, another “Give me half a tanker of iron, and I will It sounds implausible – place a giant
idea is to release particles into the give you an ice age,” said the late reflective sunshade in space to block off
atmosphere that can reflect the Sun’s oceanographer John Martin in 1988. some of the sunlight that reaches Earth.
ILLUSTRATION: ACUTE GRAPHICS

radiation themselves. This year, Harvard
professors David Keith and Frank Keutsch,
designers of the Stratospheric Controlled
Perturbation Experiment (SCoPEx), plan to
launch a high-altitude balloon 20km into
the air near Tucson, Arizona, and spray a
small quantity of calcium carbonate
particles to see what happens.
Although he was half joking, Martin stood
by his idea of using iron to boost plankton
and increase the carbon dioxide taken up
from the atmosphere. Since then, several
tests have been carried out. A key question
is how much of the plankton will actually
sink to the seabed, locking the carbon
away from the atmosphere.
Wacky as it sounds, this idea has been
receiving some consideration: in a report
by the Royal Society, it was suggested that
in the long-term, some form of space
sunshade may be cheaper and less risky
than a geoengineering project in the
stratosphere. Tests are currently confined
to modelling effects of various approaches.

53
 FOP318

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55
NEUROSCIENCE

Kirk Rutter’s
severe depression
improved after he
took psilocybin

5
56
 At any given moment, more than 3 per cent of the UK
population are thought to be suffering from depression.
For some people, like Kirk Rutter, symptoms persist
despite treatment. Could psilocybin – the psychedelic
drug found in magic mushrooms – help to put an end to
depression by ‘rebooting’ the brain?
WORDS: KAT ARNEY
PHOTOGRAPHY: FRAN MONKS

WARNING
Psilocybin and hallucinogenic mushrooms are a Class A drug according to UK law. Anyone caught in possession of
such substances will face up to seven years in prison, an unlimited fine, or both. More information and support for
those affected by substance abuse problems can be found at bit.ly/drug_support

57
NEUROSCIENCE

irk never got over the death of

“I was open to
K
his mot her. When she passed
away in 2011 after a long illness,
the 47-year-old IT specialist kept
himself busy by organising her something
funeral and dealing with the other
administrative tasks that come with a death in the
family. But while his father and brother managed
potentially a bit
to pick themselves up and move on, he struggled
to come to terms with the loss.
“After the funeral was over there was nothing left
more healing than
to organise or create, and I found myself in a kind of
void that just persisted until I was overwhelmed,” just trying to gloss
he says. “After six months I was still talking about
her death, and I wondered whether I should be
over it by now. Should I have moved on? Should I
over the feelings
be better? But I didn’t really feel that way – I kept
feeling worse and worse until I was just chronically
sad all the time.”
or chemically
Eventually, Kirk spiralled into a deep depression
that reached into all areas of his life. He signed up
dull them”
for counselling and visited a therapist every week for
a year. It didn’t work. His GP prescribed a number
of different antidepressants, but they didn’t work
either. “The drugs just turned me into a zombie,”
he says. “And although I talked through everything
else in my life during counselling, I just couldn’t
talk about the grief. It was too difficult. When I felt
it bubbling up I would just change the subject.”
Every year, thousands of people in the UK are
diagnosed with depression and these numbers
keep rising. While antidepressants are a common
treatment, studies suggest that more than half of all
patients don’t respond to the first drug they’re given.
A significant proportion of people with depression
fail to find something that works for them, ending
up cycling through periods of treatment and relapse.
ABOVE: The volunteers took psilocybin in a safe, relaxing environment, to reduce the risk of
In search of a more effective approach, researchers experiencing anxiety or a bad trip
PHOTOS: THOMAS ANGUS/IMPERIAL, SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY, MENDEL KAELEN

at Imperial College London have been finding out

whether the mind- and mood-altering properties
of psychedelic drugs such as psilocybin (the active
ingredient in magic mushrooms) could be helpful
for treating psychiatric conditions. Led by Dr Robin
Carhart-Harris, a team of researchers have been
running a clinical trial testing the effects of psilo-
cybin on a small group of people with intractable
depression. People just like Kirk.

THE PSYCHEDELIC SPA

“We’d been doing brain imaging studies looking
at the effects of psilocybin which suggested that it
might have antidepressant effects,” explains Carhart-
Harris. “We also knew that psychedelic drugs can
dissolve the ego [the sense of ‘self’] temporarily.
ABOVE: These MRI scans show a ‘normal’ brain (left) and a brain under the influence of LSD (right).
This is accompanied by the possibility of emotional, It is thought that psilocybin may affect the brain in a similar way to LSD – both hallucinogens have
personal, philosophical and existential insight, so been trialled to treat depression
it was a case of joining the dots.”

58
 Spurred on by a previous
previo study showing
that people who took psil psilocybin reported a
long-term increase in psych
psychological wellbeing
and a trial showing the d drug’s benefits for
treating anxiety and deprdepression in terminal
cancer patients, Carhart-H
Carhart-Harris put together
a plan to test whether it could
c relieve treat-
ment-resistant depression
depression.
Despite receiving some funding from the
Medical Research Council
Counci in 2012, the pro-
posal was hampered by ethical and regu-
latory red tape, as well as a the challenge of
obtaining clinical-grade ps psilocybin. But after
three frustrating years C Carhart-Harris was
finally able to start recru
recruiting patients for
his unconventional clinical
clinic trial, and Kirk
was one of them.
“I was open to someth
something potentially a
b it more healing than ju
bit just trying to gloss
over the feelings or chemically
chem dull them,”
Kirk says. After an initial interview over the
phone, he was invited to come to Imperial
College’s clinical research facility in London
ABOVE: Dr Robin
Carhart-Harris, who is
for a longer discussion and an a lengthy ques-
carrying out the tionnaire. Next was an or orientation session,
psilocybin research allowing Kirk to get used tto the environment
BELOW: Various magic in which the drug would be administered.
mushrooms are found He was taught a grounding
groun technique to
throughout the world combat anxiety and stay anchored in real-
ity. Then came a blindfold and headphones
playing a specially curated
curate music selection
ranging from ambient ssounds and tribal
rhythms to soaring opera, interspersed with
short periods of silence. (Li
(Listen to the playlist
at mendelkaelen.com/mu
mendelkaelen.com/music.html)
“I went into this hospita
hospital room and it was
done up like a psychedelic
psychedeli spa!” he laughs.
“There were throws, imitaimitation candles, aro-
matherapy machines – it w was very relaxing.
So, when it came to ac actually taking the
first dose of psilocybi
psilocybin I felt reassured
because I’d seen the room
ro and heard the
music, I’d been in that space and thought
it was a nice environment.”
environm

TRIPPING ON TRIAL
The researchers tested 19 1 volunteers with
two doses of psilocybin – 10mg and 25mg –
given a week apart, each with an MRI scan
PHOTOS: SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY

b efore and afterwards. Wh

before While the first dose is
relatively low so the partic
participants get used to
the sensation, the second one packs a bigger
psychedelic punch.
“It’s a big trip, and it’s
it probably more
than people would take recreationally,”
explains Carhart-Harris. “That’s
“ the kind of
dose required
q p
to produce ego dissolution, 2

59
NEUROSCIENCE
THE SCIENCE OF
PSYCHEDELICS
At a molecular level,
psilocybin works on the
serotonin system in the
brain. Serotonin is a
neurotransmitter that sends
signals between neigh-
bouring nerve cells. It’s
often described as the
‘happy chemical’, but in fact
there is a complex and
poorly understood
relationship between
serotonin and mood.
Psilocybin sticks to the
serotonin 2A receptor – 1 of
14 different types of
serotonin receptor found on
nerve cells – and appears to
induce a state known as
plasticity, where systems
and pathways in the brain
can be reset. A principal
system affected by
psilocybin is the default
mode network, which is
involved in higher-level
conscious functions
including our sense of self
48
(ego) and the story we
construct about our identity
and place in the world.
Depression is charac-
terised by entrenched,
intrusive thought patterns,
reflected by abnormal
activity in the default mode
network. Under the
influence of psilocybin,
this network seems to
temporarily dissolve and
break down, leading to a
loss of self-identity and a
strong sense of inter-
connectedness with the rest
of the world. It literally
opens the mind.
By breaking down these
embedded systems and
allowing them to reform in a
new way, psilocybin can
help to ‘reset’ the brain. This
could provide a way for
people to break free from
their depression and
move towards healthier
thought patterns.
2 the sense of oneness that has been said to be at
the core of what some people describe as a mystical
experience on psychedelics. It’s a massive trip, but
they’re doing it in a controlled way in a clinical
research facility with psychiatrists, beautiful music,
low lighting, nice furnishings, and an emergency
medical response team on hand in case anything
goes wrong.”
For Kirk, this higher dose produced a profound
effect. “After taking the higher dose I started seeing
this weird Sanskrit writing, then it got a lot busier
and more psychedelic,” he says. “The music played
a big part of the experience – it’s like a river guiding
you through a landscape. I remember an operatic
piece that felt like I was being lifted up and it was
all washing over me, then it guided me to a sad
place where all the grief came up. At one point my
eyeshade was so wet I had to wring it out because
I’d let go of so much sadness.”
This intense emotional release enabled Kirk to
finally address the feelings he had buried since the
death of his mother.
“Right afterwards I felt very relaxed and spaced
out, and I had a really good sleep that night,” he
says. “There was a lot of processing that happened,
coming to terms with the grief. There will always
“At one point my eyeshade
was so wet I had to wring
it out because I’d let go of
so much sadness”
be that sense of loss, but I’m not crushed by it like
I was before and I’ve become much less withdrawn
at work and socially. A week after the treatment I
was out shopping with a friend and I just had this
sensation of space around me. I realised it was a
feeling of optimism that I hadn’t had for so long,
and it felt really good.”
Overall, the results of the trial were impressive.
Psilocybin caused no significant side effects other
than mild nausea and headaches in some people,
and didn’t lead to any unpleasant flashbacks. More
importantly, it seemed to work. All the participants
PHOTOS: FRAN MONKS, SHUTTERSTOCK
had a reduction in their depression symptoms,
with those who had the most extreme psychedelic
experiences having the greatest improvement – an
effect that has persisted in the long term. Two years
after taking part in the study, Kirk is still feeling
well and hasn’t returned to taking antidepressants.
Carhart-Harris also saw a difference in the brain
scans of volunteers after they’d undergone the treat-
ment. He noticed that certain networks in the brain
seemed to break down under the influence of psilo-
cybin and reformed again afterwards, particularly the
default mode network – a system in the brain that is
associated with our internal world and sense of self
(see box, left). He also saw a boost in responsiveness
in a region of the brain called the amygdala, which
is associated with emotions – the opposite of the
emotional flattening that many people experience
when taking conventional antidepressants.
“The default mode network is over-engaged in
people with depression and it’s hard to turn it off,
so they get stuck in a rut in their own head. When
people are in the throes of an intense psychedelic
experience the default mode network will be quite
markedly disintegrated,” he says, pointing out that
the people who showed the most clear reformation
of the default mode network after taking the drug
were those who improved most after treatment.
“With psilocybin, you take a system that is some-
how functioning abnormally and shake it up in a
controlled setting – you scramble it up, melt it, shake
it up – and then you let it reformat, and maybe it
resets in a way that is somehow healthier. There is
a loss of sense of self and identity, but what replaces
it is a sense of being connected to nature and other ABOVE: In the 1960s, treatment,” he says.
people and the Universe,” says Carhart-Harris. while a faculty member Yet despite the potential of the drug, funders and
at Harvard, Dr Timothy
Leary carried out policymakers remain wary of psilocybin’s reputation,
DON’T TRY THIS AT HOME psilocybin studies on much of which stems from unchecked or unethical
volunteers. However, his
Although the results from the trial are promising, studies had a lack of
research practices dating back decades. For example,
Carhart-Harris cautions against trying psychedelics scientific rigour and did the US military is known to have carried out exper-
without medical supervision. For a start, psilocybin not follow correct iments aimed at weaponising hallucinogenic drugs
research protocol. He
and magic mushrooms are Class A drugs in the UK was fired from the including psilocybin, while Harvard psychologist
and carry heavy penalties for possession or supply. university and thrown Timothy Leary gained notoriety for his mind-ex-
There are also significant psychological risks. out of academia, but panding psychedelic explorations in the 1960s.
became a figurehead for
“Psychedelics induce a state of sensitivity and the counterculture and Due to the difficulties in gaining funding for his
vulnerability,” he explains. “People are in a state of drug movement work, Carhart-Harris’s research is currently supported
special psychological plasticity just like children are, by private donations. A UK-based start-up company,
and they’re sensitive to context and emotion more Compass Pathways, is also seeking funding to carry
than they ordinarily would be. It’s important that out a larger-scale clinical trial of psilocybin across
they are nurtured and protected – if the conditions Europe. But although he’s excited about the potential
aren’t right then the experience can be bad and you for psychedelic drugs, Carhart-Harris also knows
can potentially harm people.” that the underlying research base needs to be solid,
Carhart-Harris is planning a new trial which is and a lot more work remains to be done.
due to start recruiting up to 50 patients in early “I’m not wanting to romanticise these compounds
2018, comparing a single dose of psilocybin with a or preach about them – there are risks and things
six-week course of the ‘gold standard’ antidepressant have to be done properly and carefully. This is a real
drug escitalopram. He also thinks that psilocybin opportunity for a major paradigm shift in psychiatry,
therapy could be beneficial for many other psycho- but it needs to happen at the right pace. We can’t
logical conditions involving embedded or repetitive push it too hard too soon and repeat the mistakes
thought processes, including anxiety, eating disorders, of the past,” he says.
obsessive compulsive disorder, chronic pain and
post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). And he’s keen
to explore whether it could help prevent people in Kat Arney is a science writer, presenter and broadcaster. Her
the early stages of depression from sliding into the latest book is How To Code A Human (£16.99, Andre Deutsch).
kind of deep despair that Kirk experienced.
D I S C OV E R M O R E
“Prescriptions of antidepressants are going up

u
year-on-year but a lot of people don’t want to take Watch a clip from The Brain: A Secret History in which BBC
them – often for valid reasons – so we shouldn’t presenter Michael Mosley take a dose of psilocybin at
prevent them from having access to psilocybin bit.ly/psilocybin_brain

61
 To listen to an
episode of In Our Time
about feathered
dinosaurs, visit
bbc.in/2DX3GMy

If the dinosaurs hadn’t been wiped out in a mass extinction

66 million years ago, the world would look very different today
Words: John Pickrell Illustrations: James Gilleard

Artist’s impression of how

dinosaurs could have looked,
if they had survived
DINOSAURS

round 66 million years ago, a own history, only the feathered theropod dinosaurs
14km-wide asteroid smashed into (a group of bipedal dinosaurs) we know as birds made

A our planet. An estimated 15 billion

tonnes of soot spread through the
atmosphere, creating one long night
that lasted several years and made
photosynthesis all but impossible. It heralded an
endless winter that saw average temperatures fall by
as much as 28oC. These are the conditions that the
few wretched creatures that survived the initial
impact had to endure – not to mention the
earthquakes, tsunamis, wildfires and volcanic
eruptions that swiftly followed in its wake.
Around three-quarters of all species went extinct
and no animal bigger than a Labrador dog survived.
But according to researchers at the University of
Texas, things could have been very different. They
reported findings that had the asteroid struck Earth
just a few minutes earlier, it would have hit the deep
ocean rather than the shallow sea of the Yucatan
Peninsula in present-day Mexico.
Had that been the case, then the damage would
have been more localised. Some of the dinosaurs
far from the impact site might have survived, and
the world would be a different place today. In our
it through the calamity, but how would things have
turned out if their larger relatives had joined them?
Would dinosaurs still be alive today and could mam-
mals such as humans have evolved? What would our
world look like if we shared it with the descendants
of animals like T. rex and Triceratops?
“I’m sure a fairly nice diversity of non-avian dino-
saurs would still be here,” says Dr Stephen Brusatte,
a palaeontologist at the University of Edinburgh.
“If there was no sudden, catastrophic shock of the
asteroid, I really don’t see anything that’s happened
since – whether it was the spread of grasslands;
changing ocean currents; the separation of Antarctica
“Given that arms were
non-critical for hunting,
it’s possible a tyrannosaur
could have been armless”

64
from South America, which caused a cold snap; or
the more recent Ice Ages – that would have knocked
off the dinosaurs.”
Over the years many have tried to imagine what kind
of creatures dinosaurs might have evolved into had
they survived. The most famous attempt is a 1988 book
called The New Dinosaurs: An Alternative Evolution,
by Scottish geologist and author Dougal Dixon. For this
magnificent work of speculative zoology, Dixon conjured
up creatures such as the ‘cutlasstooth’ – a pack-hunt-
ing, sabre-toothed predator from South America; the
‘cribrum’ – a flamingo-like, filter-feeding theropod from
Australia; and the ‘gourmand’ – a relative of T. rex that
lost its front limbs entirely and developed a distensible
jaw to allow it to rapidly swallow prey whole, much like
a snake.
Perhaps this last idea isn’t entirely wide of the
mark. Dr Tom Holtz, an expert on theropod dino-
saurs at the University of Maryland in the US, says
that both tyrannosaurs and abelisaurs, the two types
of big meat-eater present in the Late Cretaceous, are
notable for their tiny forelimbs. “Given that arms were
non-critical for hunting, it’s possible that a Cenozoic
[current geological era] tyrannosaur could have been
armless,” says Holtz. 2

65
THE DINOSAURS THAT If the dinosaurs had continued to
evolve, all kinds of new body forms
COULD HAVE BEEN might have developed
1 Dino-monkeys
Once flowering plants appeared in the Cretaceous,
there was no stopping them. Fruit became abundant
during the Cenozoic, so tree-dwelling, primate-like
feathered dinosaurs may have evolved to take
advantage of the sugary goodness.

2 Burrow dwellers
Curiously, few known dinosaurs appear to have used
burrows – perhaps given more time, rodent- or
mole-like species may have evolved to exploit the
subterranean environment.

3 Woolly wonders
Many theropod dinosaurs had feathers and we know
some lived at Arctic latitudes – perhaps both carnivores
and herbivores would have developed thick, shaggy
pelts during the Ice Ages, something akin to musk ox,
woolly rhinos or mammoths. 1
4 Grassland grazers
As the world cooled 34 million years ago at the end
of the Eocene, forests retreated and grasslands
spread globally. Slender, speedy dinosaurs with
teeth specialised for cropping grasses would likely
have evolved to devour this new resource.

5 Whale-o-saurs 3
Unlike their relatives – the mosasaurs,
ichthyosaurs and plesiosaurs – few dinosaurs
exploited marine environments. Perhaps
creatures similar to Spinosaurus could eventually
have become dinosaurian filter-feeding
equivalents of baleen whales.

5
 “You can’t underestimate have evolved complex social groups like primates is
pure speculation.”
the importance of that Other ecological spaces little explored by dinosaurs
were aquatic environments. “In mammals we’ve seen
extinction really hitting a return to the sea, in several different iterations,” says
Farke. “We’ve had things like whales and manatees

the reset button for that have gone back into the oceans, and things like
otters that spend a lot of time in the water. It’s cool to
think about what dinosaurs could have looked like if
mammals and clearing they’d gone in a cetacean direction.”
But if their giant marine reptile relatives – the mosa-
the playing field” saurs and plesiosaurs – had survived, then dinosaurs
might have found it hard to get a foothold.
There could also have been other consequences
of dinosaurs and their reptilian relatives, such as
2 The beginning of the Cenozoic Era (which spans the f lying pterosaurs, not petering out at the end
the period from 66 million years ago until the pres- of the Cretaceous. Although birds co-existed with
ent day) might essentially have been an ecological dinosaurs for a long time in the Cretaceous, their
Certain
extension of the Late Cretaceous. Various creatures dinosaurs
diversity was low compa red to today. “Modern
such as titanosaur sauropods (huge, long-necked might have bird groups under went a n explosive radiation
dinosaurs like Argentinosaurus), hadrosaurs (duck- gone back into af ter the mass extinction, maybe because ptero-
the oceans,
billed dinosaurs like Edmontosaurus), ceratopsians like the saurs went extinct and opened up new niches,” says
(horned, beaked dinosaurs like Triceratops), and manatee did Dr Victoria Arbour, a palaeontologist at t he 2
predators such as the tyrannosaurs would still have
remained common.
But as we head further from the Cretaceous towards
the present day, there would likely have been signifi-
cant changes, says Dr Andy Farke at the Raymond M.
Alf Museum of Paleontology in Claremont, California.
“If dinosaurs were still around today they’d be pretty
different to what we think of at the end of the age of
the dinosaurs – things like T. rex and Triceratops,” he
argues. “You might still recognise them as a dinosaur,
but who knows what kind of body shapes and body
plans might have come up in the past 66 million years.”
Many of the mammals with which we’re famil-
iar might not have had the opportunity to evolve.
“You can’t underestimate the importance of that
extinction 66 million years ago in really hitting the
reset button for mammals and clearing the playing
field,” adds Farke.

TREE HUGGERS
Already in the Cretaceous there were numerous fluffy,
feathered theropods scampering in the trees. Assuming
that flowering plants continued to spread and thrive
as they did in our history, then could primate-like
dinosaurs have specialised to take advantage of the
fruit they produced? Prof Matthew Bonnan, a palaeo-
biologist at Stockton University in New Jersey, argues
that primates evolved large, forward-facing eyes with
colour vision to forage for fruit.
“Is there a connection between being frugivorous
[fruit-eating] and having a larger brain? We don’t
know, but one could imagine arboreal dinosaurs that
PHOTO: GETTY

formed a co-evolutionary relationship with flowering

plants by eating their fruits and dispersing the seeds,”
he says. “Whether these fruit-eating dinosaurs would

67
DINOSAURS
2 Royal Ontario Museum in Toronto. “Without the
mass extinction, maybe birds wouldn’t be as diverse
and successful as they are today, and maybe we
wouldn’t have things like songbirds, parrots, hawks,
or hummingbirds at all.”
Most experts seem to agree that the largest land
mammals such as elephants, mammoths, giant rela-
tives of rhinos and sloths, and perhaps even horses
and giraffes, probably couldn’t have evolved if large
dinosaurs had remained to occupy the niches they
came to fill.
But perhaps smaller mammals such as rodents, bats
and primates would have been just as successful. If
that had been the case, then some of those primates
“If we speculate that
humans had evolved
alongside dinosaurs, then
they probably would have
been able to co-exist”
68
If dinosaurs could have climbed down from the trees onto the
had survived
into the Ice
grasslands and savannahs that eventually replaced
Ages, could the thick forests of the Cretaceous, and evolved into
they have hominids, as our ancestors did.
developed
thick pelts “If we speculate that humans had evolved alongside
like modern dinosaurs, then they probably would have been able
musk ox? to co-exist,” says Farke. “Humans already evolved in
ecosystems that had large land animals and predators.
We probably would have done okay.”
“Unarmed, solitary humans are still easy targets for
large predators like bears and lions,” agrees Arbour.
“But overall humans are pretty good at surviving
alongside large, dangerous animals.”
CENOZOIC EXTINCTION
Dinosaurs might not have been so lucky though, as
humans seem to have a special skill for killing off
large animals. Perhaps the biggest dinosaurs would
have gone the way of the mammoth and the dodo.
“Humans are really good at extinguishing megafauna
– through hunting, climate change or habitat destruc-
tion,” Arbour says. “Dinosaurs in the 21st Century, just
like modern animals, would probably have reduced
populations and face the threat of extinction.”
PHOTO: GETTY
Big dinosaurs would perhaps only persist in pro-
tected reserves, such as national parks and wildlife
refuges – modern-day equivalents of Jurassic Park. 2
DOMESTICATED
DINOSAURS
Had dinosaurs survived, might we
have used them for labour and food,
or hunted them as trophies?
n the cartoon The Flintstones,
I
Fred Flintstone works as a
‘bronto crane operator’,
riding a sauropod that does the
heavy lifting in a quarry. Yet it
seems unlikely that we would
ever have been able to persuade
dinosaurs to work for us in
agrarian societies – as humans
did with oxen and horses. “Given
the brainpower of some of these
dinosaurs, I can’t imagine that a
lot of them would be in the
realm of things that would
domesticate easily,” says
palaeontologist Dr Andy Farke.
But there may have been
other ways that humans could
have exploited dinosaurs.
“Animals that have been
domesticated by humans are
often those that have group
social structures like wolves,
caribou and cattle,” says
palaeontologist Dr Victoria
Arbour. “For dinosaurs, herding
species like ceratopsians and
hadrosaurs might have been
good candidates for cattle
analogues. There’s less
evidence for social behaviour in
small carnivores, but perhaps
some little predatory, feathery
theropods might have filled the
spots in our homes reserved for
dogs and cats today.”
Had we exploited some of
these larger herbivores to toil in
our fields, then surely we would
have hunted and farmed some
for meat too? This begs the
question: what would dinosaur
meat have tasted like? Of
course, if you eat chicken or
turkey today, then you are
already eating theropod
dinosaur, but the flesh of these
sedentary domesticated
creatures is a poor analogy for
T. rex meat – a better one might
be emu or ostrich, which is
packed with lean muscle due to
the animals’ sprinting abilities.
“Just as with modern farming
there’d probably be the whole
thing with wanting to get
organically raised or free-range
dinosaur meat – or corn-fed
Triceratops,” quips Farke.
Ostriches are farmed today,
so some of the fast, ostrich-like
ornithomimid dinosaurs, such
as Gallimimus (famous from the
stampede scene in Jurassic
Park), could have populated
ranches in the same way.
Battery farms of egg-laying
dinosaurs could also have been
a possibility. “The glorious thing
about dinosaurs is that they
grew very quickly,” says Farke.
Today, there are certain types
of wealthy gun-lovers who will
pay significant sums of money
to shoot lions, rhinos and
giraffes on private game
reserves. Therefore, had
dinosaurs survived to the
present, then they would surely
be the ultimate in big game.
Horned dinosaurs, duckbills
and even carnivores like T. rex
could have been targets, argues
Arbour. “Big ceratopsians,
hadrosaurs and theropods
would probably be highly
sought after for trophy
hunting,” she says.
DINOSAURS

JURASSIC
BARK?
A T. rex would
probably make
a terrible house
pet (just think
of the litter
tray!). But
could some
smaller species
have made
OQTGƂVVKPI Microraptor Sinosauropteryx
Dark and iridescent plumage, with large The first known feathered dinosaur,
companions? flight feathers on its hind and forelimbs. discovered in 1996. Has fluffy ginger
Likes to preen, nap and observe everything plumage and enjoys scratches and
with its hawk-like watchful eyes. strokes. Likes to chase toys in lieu of
SIZE: One of the tiniest dinos at less than 1kg fast-moving prey.
in weight and about 80cm in length. SIZE: A metre in length, including the long tail.
PROS: Has four wings of awesomeness. It’s But it’s very dainty, weighing just 0.5kg.
intelligent and responds well to commands. PROS: Loves to snuggle. Has fetching
CONS: Can attempt to disembowel the cat ginger-and-white tail stripes.
with its sickle-shaped second claw; requires CONS: Can be neurotic and restless, and
falconry hood during initial training. requires frequent exercise.

2 Smaller dinosaurs that infringed on crops or livestock If all the

would probably be hunted as ‘nuisance’ animals, as dinosaurs had
survived, their
wolves and dingoes are today, adds Arbour. “It would descendants
be really hard for large sauropods to survive alongside could have
given Mr
us. They’re so big and would require so much food, Seagull some
that I doubt we could set aside enough wild spaces competition for
for them to thrive.” your chips

CITY DWELLERS
The dinosaurs that might do particularly well in the
modern era are those that could learn to live and
thrive alongside people. In our world today, the vast
majority of animal biomass is made up of the species
that we farm or have domesticated, or those that
live around our cities and developments – and so it
would also have been in a reality where humans and
dinosaurs co-existed. There might have been dino-
saur equivalents of seagulls, pigeons, rats, raccoons
and foxes – all very well adapted to take advantage
of the resources available in urban environments.
“Small, scrappy dinosaurs might have been able
to eke out a living on the margins of housing devel-

70
 Psittacosaurus
This parrot-beaked herbivore would
make a good pet. It lives in herds in the
wild, so it’s highly sociable and has a fairly
gentle temperament.
SIZE: Up to 2m in length and 20kg in weight
– about the same as a medium-sized dog.
PROS: Has fluffy tail bristles and cute facial
horns; helps to keep the lawn tidy by mowing
grass with beak.
CONS: Has an unfortunate tendency to gnaw
the furnishings.
Yi qi
This teeny, pigeon-sized tree-dweller is the
only dinosaur known to have adopted a bat
method of flight. Has wings formed of skin
membranes, but also tight, downy plumage
and four pretty, ribbon-like tail feathers.
SIZE: Positively minute for a dinosaur at
80cm in length and just 380g in weight.
PROS: Small, with short, dense feathers so it
doesn’t shed much around the house.
CONS: Prone to screechiness; needs large
aviary to glide back and forth within.
Compsognathus
The smallest known dinosaur until the
1990s when a variety of dainty, feathered
relatives began to turn up in China. Lightly
built, so great for small apartments.
SIZE: Turkey-sized but much lighter. It’s up to
1m in length but just 3kg in weight.
PROS: Smaller size makes it an ideal
lap-dinosaur; it lives in packs so is
highly social.
CONS: Needs constant supply of small, live
lizards to snack upon; bit of a finger nibbler.

“Without the dinosaurs and we would very likely have taken them into our
homes as pets – the feathery or scaly equivalents of

disappearing, mammals dogs and cats.

would not have had the
same opportunity”
opments,” suggests Farke. You can just imagine little
beaked herbivorous dinosaurs nibbling at the roses
and hydrangeas in your garden.
“Animals that do well in urban environments today
tend to be those that are good at eating whatever we’re
throwing away, and making use of the structures
we build,” agrees Arbour. “Small omnivorous or
predatory theropods would perhaps have been lurking
PHOTO: GETTY
Perhaps, though, the idea that humans could have
evolved in a world filled with dinosaurs is simply too
far-fetched. “I have no doubt that we would not be
here,” says Brusatte. “The asteroid was one of those
dominoes that set in motion a chain of events that led
to us. Without the dinosaurs disappearing, mammals
would not have had the same opportunity.”
He argues that mammals had already existed with
dinosaurs for 160 million years or more when the aster-
oid struck. But they were mostly “marginal, shadowy
little creatures” and – had the asteroid not caused a
mass extinction – would likely remain that way today.
As Brusatte points out: “What’s another 66 million
years when it had already been like that for 160 million
years already.”

around garbage cans.”

Obviously, we might have domesticated dinosaurs John Pickrell is a science journalist, and author of Flying Dinosaurs.
to exploit for meat and eggs or agricultural labour, He tweets from @john_pickrell

71
 AL RIES
ED
VE OVE W

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RE DISC NE

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 CAN
WE END
ANIMAL
TESTING?
We find out whether innovative techniques using stem cells,
computer modelling and 3D-printing could reduce the number of
animals used in medical research
PHOTO: GETTY

WORDS: ALLA KATSNELSON

73
BIOLOGY

here are many disagreements in the

world of research, but few debates

T will get as heated as those surround-

ing animal testing. Many scientists
and research advocates contend that
animal experiments are crucial for
learning about basic biology and disease mechanisms,
and are necessary for testing the safety and efficacy
of new medicines and chemicals. They point to many
potent medicines that exist thanks to animal testing.
Opponents, meanwhile, contend that subjecting animals
to experiments for human gain is ethically unjustified.
What’s more, many argue, such research is often mis-
leading because it compares apples and oranges: results
from animal studies often don’t translate to humans
because the animals are just too different.

NEW METHODS
Animal welfare activists have long insisted that
researchers jettison research on animals for alter-
native methods, such as human stem cells grown
in a dish, computer model-
ling, or expanded clinical

“ANIMAL TESTING IS AN
trials. But it’s only in the past “It’s coming to a tipping
few years that most of these point.”
tools have become truly good Tallying the precise
enough for prime-time use.
Now, many researchers are IMPORTANT TOOL, BUT AT number of animals used
in research is difficult,

THE SAME TIME IT HAS

embracing these alternatives.
As Dr Donald Ingber, direc-
tor of Harvard University’s
Wyss Institute for Biologically
Inspired Engineering, says,
because countries record
animal experiments dif-
ferently. But estimates
OFTEN BEEN MISLEADING” suggest that the count
is more than 100 mil-
lion animals each year
worldwide. The major-
ity are used in basic research and breeding to create
specific genetic modifications. A smaller percentage
of animals are used to test the effects of drugs or
chemicals. More than 95 per cent of all animals used
in research are mice, rats, birds and fish, but other
species enter the mix, too. For example, some 60,000
PHOTOS: SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY X2, WAKE FOREST SCHOOL OF MEDICINE

monkeys like macaques are used in experiments in

the US, Europe and Australia.
It’s hard to deny that research on animals has advanced
human health. In the 19th Century, for example, French
biologist Louis Pasteur used animal experiments to
understand how microorganisms can cause disease,
and later to develop a vaccine for rabies. Animal stud-
ies were also crucial in understanding how insulin is
produced and in developing ways to supplement it in
people with diabetes. Penicillin was proven effective
LEFT: A
researcher in mice, blood transfusions were perfected in rabbits,
tests the and kidney transplants were tested in dogs and pigs.
effects of
ultra-high
There’s no shortage of recent examples, either.
frequency Experiments in which macaques were infected with
radiation on SIV, the monkey version of the AIDS-causing HIV virus,
a rabbit in
the 1980s were crucial in creating antiretroviral medicines and
in developing strategies for a potential HIV vaccine.

74
 LEFT: This ear was
created using a 3D
printer by Prof
Anthony Atala at WHY DO WE STILL TEST
Wake Forest
Institute for ON ANIMALS?
Regenerative
Medicine. Once it’s No matter how good the alternatives to animal
been implanted, it
develops functional testing get, it’s unlikely to be eradicated.
tissue and blood “There are certain things you cannot easily
vessels, so could be
used to replace
test without animals,” says toxicologist Prof
diseased or Thomas Hartung. This includes studies on
damaged tissue in psychiatric disorders in which tracking a
patients. The team
used the same behavioural change is important, or studies of
technology to create conditions where regions of a particular organ
bone and muscle, on are affected differently, such as tuberculosis.
which to test novel
treatments And even though stem cell technologies are
improving fast, they still have some major
BELOW: Stem cells,
which can be used in
limitations. Some cell types that are important
medical testing, can in disease are difficult to produce, for example.
be harvested from And even linking up human stem cell
young human
embryos, like the models representing several organs doesn’t
one pictured here on reveal a drug’s response to a living, breathing
the end of a needle organism. These systems are simply not
well-enough developed for wide-scale use. “In
the end, our quest is to give the right answer
regarding a medicine’s safety and efficacy,”
says Roche Pharmaceuticals’ Thomas Singer.
“We are agnostic as to whether an animal
Deep brain stimulation, used by some 20,000 people model or an alternative model would be best.”
with Parkinson’s disease, relied on rat and monkey One hold-up in moving to alternatives is the
models to understand how the disease affects a part of fact that countries have different rules for
the brain called the basal ganglia and how surgically when or whether animal tests are needed for a
implanting a stimulator could improve patients’ motor product to be sold. Even if a cell culture test for
symptoms. And brain-machine interfaces that allow a certain pesticide has been accepted in one
paralysed people to perform everyday tasks, such as country as better than an older animal test,
bringing a coffee cup to their lips, are being developed companies that plan to sell it in countries
with the help of experiments in monkeys. where this test is not accepted must do the
animal tests. “You can develop a [non-
A DYING BREED? animal] method, get it validated, and get it
Yet many scientists would now agree that for some used, in every country
studies, animal experiments are no longer the best but one,” says Dr Amy
way forward. “Animal testing is an important tool – it Clippinger, associate
has made our world safer and it has helped to develop director of PETA’s
certain drugs – but at the same time it has very often International Science
been misleading,” says Prof Thomas Hartung, a toxi- Consortium. “And if
cologist and the director of the Center for Alternatives companies want to sell
to Animal Testing at Johns Hopkins University in in that country, you will
Baltimore, Maryland. He says that in just the past few see no reduction in
years, there has been more agreement on the limitations animal use.”
of animal testing and “the belief that this is some type For such regulatory
of gold standard is fading”. matters, says Hartung,
Among researchers and the public, support for decreasing animal use
limiting animal research where possible seems to will to some extent
be growing. In the past few years, the European depend on a changing of
Union, Israel and India have banned animal testing the guard. “There are
for cosmetics, and other countries are considering still too many people
similar laws. (The UK led the way with the first such who overestimate the
ban back in 1989.) Countries throughout the world value of animal tests,” he
have largely phased out research on Old World pri- says. “Some things will
mates such as chimpanzees, and in many regions the change one retirement
use of other non-human primates – as well as some at a time.”
other mammalian species – is also on the decline.
Meanwhile, regulatory bodies like the US Food and 2

75
BIOLOGY

2 Drug Administration (FDA), which have long

insisted on animal studies, are beginning to evaluate
whether alternative technologies can show similar or
better results, says Ingber, and companies are trying
to implement these tools into their pipeline.

CHANGING TIMES
It’s not just ethical concerns spurring this change.
Switching to studies that use human tissue instead
of a nimals may of ten ma ke for better science.
Experimental medicines that seem to be effective in
animals (usually rodents) often fail in human trials; 9
out of 10 cancer drugs, and 98 out of 100 neurological
and psychiatric drugs that show promise in animal

The lung-on-a-chip is about

the size of a memory stick. It is
THE LUNG-ON-A-CHIP
made of clear, rubber material This is the most advanced organ-on-a-chip, designed by
and contains hollow channels Harvard’s Wyss Institute. The chip acts just like a human
lung and has already helped scientists test new drugs and
look for markers for asthma and chronic obstructive
pulmonary disease. The chip can be seeded with diseased
cells from a patient, which retain their ailments when
planted in the chip. This allows researchers to find better
treatments for a specific patient’s needs.
In the diagram below, you can see how Wyss Institute
researchers triggered a response to infection in the chip.

Rhythmic suction is
VA 1. Infection is simulated
applied so the cells CU
UM by adding bacteria to the
contract and relax, to C HA air channel
mimic breathing motions NN
EL

AIR
CH
AN
NE
L
LIV
ING
2. As bacteria HU
start to attack the MA
NL
lung cells, white UN
GC
blood cells detect PO EL
RO LS
inflammation, US
and migrate ME
MB
across the porous LIV R AN
membrane. The VE ING E
membrane S S BL O
EL
mimics the CE OD
LIQ LL
interface UID S
between blood B LO
OD
cells and lung C HA
cells in a capillary NN
EL

3. The white blood cells

move into the air channel
and engulf the bacteria, to
4. If required, drugs can kill them
be introduced to the chip
to test their efficacy

76
 tests don’t turn out to work when tested in humans.
Animal studies certainly don’t deserve the full blame
for this disconnect, but finding better and more pre-
dictive disease models might help, researchers say.
There are also cases where a human disease simply
can’t be modelled in animals. For example, Alysson
Muotri, a neuroscientist at the University of California,
San Diego, studies a rare but devastating neurological
disease called Aicardi-Goutieres Syndrome (AGS).
The mutations causing AGS are well-known, but
when Muotri studied mice that had been genetically
engineered to carry these mutations, he found that
they had no symptoms. When his team grew cell
structures called organoids from stem cells derived
from tissues of patients with the disease, they recre-
ated the nerve cells’ glitch. They learned that what
causes the disease is an immune response to an ele-
ment of DNA that is specific to humans. “It’s a case
where we have a truly human disorder,” Muotri says.
“We couldn’t see it in the mouse, and very likely we
wouldn’t see it in a primate.”
One especially promising human cell-based alterna-
tive to animal research is so-called ‘organ-on-a-chip’
technology, in which specific types of human stem
cells are grown with membranes on a microchip to
mimic the function of specific organs. “There are lots
of things you can do on these chips that you can’t do
in animal testing,” says Ingber, who has developed
about 15 such devices, along with his colleagues, for
mimicking the function of organs including the lungs,
intestine, kidney and bone marrow. Each chip, the
size of a computer memory stick, is engraved with
tiny channels that are lined with human cells and
artificial blood vessel tissue. The tools also capture
physiological features such as blood pressure and
mechanical forces that act on cells. Researchers can
link up to 10 chips together with vascular channels
containing human blood in order to study how organ
systems interact.
PHOTOS: WYSS INSTITUTE/HARVARD UNIVERSITY ILLUSTRATION: ACUTE GRAPHICS
“We’ve been able to mimic amazing things – diseases
of all types, pulmonary oedema, asthma, chronic
obstructive pulmonary disease, inflammatory bowel
disease, viral infection, drug toxicities – and we’ve
been able to make chips with cells from patients,”
Ingber says. These devices reveal drug toxicities that
don’t show up in animal models, and can also probe
questions that can’t be asked in clinical trials for
ethical reasons. His team is using them to model the
effects of radiation exposure, as well as childhood
illnesses and malnutrition.
But organs-on-a-chip aren’t just for university sci-
entists. Roche Pharmaceuticals, one of the top five
drug companies worldwide, embraced the technology
three years ago and already uses it to test the safety
of new compounds. “It opens a totally new field of
opportunities to us in biology and drug discovery,
and all of them are much better than an animal
ever can be,” says Thomas Singer, Roche’s global
head of pharmaceutical sciences. As this and other
tools improve further, more companies have adopted
them, banking on them being more reproducible and
predictable than animal tests. “In the beginning we
were very much on our own,” Singer says. “But I
am convinced this technology will see a huge boost
in development.”
“THERE ARE LOTS OF THINGS
YOU CAN DO ON THESE CHIPS
THAT YOU CAN’T DO IN
ANIMAL TESTING”
TINY ORGANS
Ot her huma n cell-based alternatives to a nimal
models are becoming available too. Prof Anthony Atala,
director of the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative
Medicine in North Carolina, is creating tissues and
organs such as bladders and kidneys using a 3D printer
that spits out different types of human cells. “You
are miniaturising a human organ, really,” he says.
Initially, his team built these organs for surgical use
in the body, but he soon realised that they could be
standardised and mass-produced in minutes – ideal
specs for screening new medicines and testing their
safety. Initially, he says, such technologies will just
supplement the animal studies, but eventually they
can replace them.
Toxicology studies, for medicines as well as for all
sorts of other chemicals, are a low-hanging fruit for
switching to alternative methods, explains Hartung.
Many animal tests are particularly bad at predicting
toxicity in humans, not to mention slow and expen-
sive to conduct, and in many cases, more modern,
cell- or computer-based assays have been developed.
Pushing the issue, a European law passed a decade
ago requires thousands of chemicals to be assessed for
safety. Hartung and other toxicologists in academia
and industry have developed a computer model that
can predict the toxicity of a compound based on its
similarity to others. “This is astonishingly powerful,”
he says.
But despite the promise of all these techniques,
experts say, change will probably come slowly, and
it’s likely that some forms of animal models will never
be eliminated at all. As Ingber puts it, “I think we are
going to replace animal testing one model at a time.”
Alla Katsnelson is a science writer and editor with a PhD
in mammalian brain development.
77

HELEN CZERSKI ON… FROST
“THERE ARE CLEAR AND FROSTY MORNINGS,
WHEN THE OUTSIDE WORLD HAS TRANSFORMED
ITSELF INTO A TWINKLING DISNEY SET”
he weather at the
T
moment is a bit grim:
grey and cold with a
generous dash of
sleet. But there are
clear and frosty mornings that
make up for it, when the outside
world has transformed itself into a
twinkling Disney set. Yet when you
look at the frost, it isn’t evenly
distributed. Plants and wooden
benches are often covered in it, but
metal railings and the patches of
ground beneath trees aren’t. It looks
as though frost is an indicator for
something, but what is it?
The beauty of frost comes from
the moment of its formation. When
we think of water cooling, we tend
to assume that water vapour will
condense to form liquid water,
which will then freeze to form ice.
But frost is assembled from thin air
and bypasses the middle stage
completely. Molecules of water in
the air bump into an ice crystal and
just freeze directly onto it, dropping
into place on the existing crystal
structure. It turns out that a floating
water molecule is more likely to
join the frozen crowd if there’s a
space for it on a rough surface, so
lumps and bumps get filled in and
nice, smooth crystalline facets
form. But that doesn’t answer the
question about where frost is most
likely to happen.
For frost to form, a solid surface
needs to be below 0°C, and there
needs to be sufficient water in the air. When it’s close to
freezing, the air is generally very dry already, but if
there are more than five water molecules in every
ILLUSTRATION: KYLE SMART
thousand air molecules, the air is officially
supersaturated, and frost can be water’s route out. This
is part of the puzzle – pockets of cold, humid air are
where you will find frost. For example, some dark
Dr Helen Czerski is a physicist
and BBC presenter. Her new
series on temperature is out
this month.
NEXT ISSUE: COCOA POWDER
EVERYDAY SCIENCE
surfaces radiate their heat away
quickly, and so they will cool
more than their surroundings,
dropping below the temperature
needed for frost. This explains why
there’s often a frost-free patch under
a tree. The tree is insulating the
ground around it, preventing the
soil from dropping below the
critical temperature.
But there’s one extra condition for
frost formation. Even if the
temperature and humidity are right,
frost may still not form. And that’s
because, for that first floating water
molecule to freeze when it bumps
into a solid surface, that surface has
to have the right structure for it to
lock on to. If there’s already ice
there, that’s perfect – the new
molecule can just slot into its place
in the ice crystal. If not, you need a
nucleus. This is a starting point that
provides the right structure, like a
flat Lego baseplate that lets you
position the first bricks. Plants are
often beautifully frosted because
bacteria on their surface play the
nucleus role. There are a few types
of bacteria that do this, and they’re
extremely common. Without this
coating of biological ice nuclei,
plants would stay frost-free to lower
temperatures. But nature is full of
bacteria, and frosted lawns and
hedges are the result.
So that cheerful frosty morning
can be appreciated on two levels.
There’s the white sparkle itself, and
there are the invisible patterns of
temperature, humidity and ice
nuclei that are revealed in the
twinkling. But frost appreciation is
a chilly hobby, and the sort of thing
that earns you a hot drink when you
get back inside. Brrr!
79
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 DR ALASTAIR ALEX FRANKLIN- DR PETER PROF ALICE PROF MARK CHARLOTTE
GUNN CHEUNG J BENTLEY GREGORY LORCH CORNEY
Astronomer, Environment/ Computer Psychologist, Chemist, Zoo director,
astrophysicist climate expert scientist, author sleep expert science writer conservationist

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SCALES JARRETT DAVIES VILLAZON PRASAD MATTHEWS
Oceans expert, Neuroscientist, Heath expert, Science/tech Biologist, Physicist,
science writer science writer science writer writer geneticist science writer

YOUR QUESTIONS ANSWERED

FEBRUARY 2018 EDITED BY JAMES LLOYD

Why is air invisible?

BRITTNEY W’S GRADE 2 CLASS, VIA TWITTER

Air is made up mostly of nitrogen and oxygen

molecules that are spread too thinly to affect light
noticeably by, say, altering its colour or intensity.
Even so, air’s presence is revealed in hot weather
through the shimmering effect called ‘heat haze’.
PHOTO: GETTY

This is the result of the heat causing fluctuations

in the density of the air, which in turn affects its
optical properties. RM

Stratolaunch will have the

longest wingspan of any
81
aeroplane and, once it’s
complete, will be used to
propel satellites into orbit

Why
y do oysters
y No. Wood is mostly cellulose, lignin
make pearls?
SUSAN BR AGG, BARNSTAPLE
It’s an immune response designed to protect the
oyster from a parasite or an injury (not just a grain
of sand as is commonly believed). Cells from the
mantle of the oyster form a pearl sac around the
irritation. The pearl sac then secretes calcium
carbonate and conchiolin protein that builds up in
layers to form an impermeable barrier. LV
Do heat patches really help with
muscle pain?
JA SON ORBEN, USA
Although heat should not be used for a fresh
injury, it can certainly be beneficial for long-
term conditions. Heat patches dilate blood
vessels, promoting blood flow and helping to
relax painful muscles. Tissue injury activates
nerve endings in the skin called nociceptors,
which transmit signals to the brain to inform it
of pain. At the same time, neurotransmitters
initiate a reflex that causes muscles to contract
at the injury site, often to the point of spasm.
Fortunately, heat can activate temperature-
sensitive thermoreceptors, which initiate
nerve signals to block those from nociceptors.
Applying pressure also helps, by triggering
nerve endings called proprioceptors.
Activating the sets of receptors helps painful
muscles to relax. ED
82
I N N UM B E R S
Can you melt wood?
17
CHARLIE SMITH, VIA EMAIL
The number of named
storms in 2017.
99.95
The percentage of light
absorbed by black feathers
and water. If you heat wood, the water
boils away first and then the lignin
on birds of paradise. This
rivals Vantablack, the darkest
and cellulose (both long-chain organic material on Earth.
99
molecules) will react with oxygen and
burn. Even in a vacuum, these molecular
chains are too long and tangled to wiggle
free into the liquid phase before they
reach temperatures high enough to break
their bonds. Instead they break down into The percentage of green
smaller substances, like methane and sea turtles being born
organic compounds containing carbon female on the northern
and hydrogen. RM Great Barrier Reef.
Is it possible to sleep with your eyes open?
PHOTOS: GETTY X6 ILLUSTRATIONS: RAJA LOCKEY
RICHARD KIM, VIA EMAIL
Not normally, but there is a condition called nocturnal lagophthalmos where
a sufferer is unable to shut their eyelids when asleep. According to one review,
this occurs in up to 5 per cent of adults. This can be due to a variety of factors,
including protruding eyes or abnormalities of the eyelids. There are also cases
in which the cause has not been established. Noctural lagophthalmos can
lead to certain difficulties, from sore eyes to more severe problems such as the
development of ulcers on the cornea. Do talk to your doctor if you are waking
up with red or sore eyes or have been told by someone that you sleep with
your eyes open. AGr
 W H AT H A P P E N S I N MY B O DY …

...WHEN I GET A CUT?

Your skin’s most important job is to keep out the billions of harmful bacteria that swarm over every surface. Any wound that
penetrates the dermis layer and causes bleeding will allow bacteria to get in, so we have evolved a precisely coordinated
mechanism to seal up the gap as quickly as possible. The healing process uses extra collagen protein for the repair, so the new
skin is actually stronger than before. This shows as a visible scar.

SMALL CUT

1. Haemostasis 2. Inflammation 3. Proliferation

When the skin is punctured, blood vessels contract Next the blood vessels expand again to allow white After a few days, fibroblast cells arrive and produce
and platelets release fibrin proteins that tangle blood cells to flock to the wound site. These attack collagen. This protein acts like a scaffold, while the
together to form a clot and seal the wound. any bacteria that got past the clot. dermis cells reproduce to close up the wound.

LARGE CUT

1. Keep it clean 2. Seal it 3. Scarring

Wash the open cut to prevent bacteria getting trapped A plaster keeps dirt out and helps the clot form. If The skin continually rebuilds the collagen matrix
inside. Don’t use disinfectant because this will kill your the wound is still bleeding after 10 minutes with a for up to a year after the cut. This scar tissue will
own cells that are trying to repair the wound. plaster on, you may need stitches. fade slightly for another year after that.

Does a cup of tea cool quicker if it’s stirred?

ADRIAN SINCL AIR, WILTSHIRE

Yes, but not enough to make it worth doing. A metal spoon in a cup of
tea will act as a radiator, conducting heat to the air. If you stir it as
well, you are bringing the hotter liquid from the centre of the cup to
the edges, where it can cool faster. But experiments have shown that
stirring a cuppa continuously for 10 minutes will only drop the
temperature by 2°C, compared with just leaving it to stand. The
Why do dogs wag their tails? fastest way to cool your tea down is to add a bit more milk, or a splash
JOE GOODMAN, VIA EMAIL of cold water. LV

Dogs ‘talk’ with their tails. The position of the

tail can tell us a lot about how a dog is feeling;
hung low suggests fear and submission, whereas
held high is a sign of dominance and arousal.
A wagging tail often conveys happiness and
excitement but neuroscientists at the University
of Trento in Italy have found that the speed and
direction of wag is important in ascertaining if
the dog is either negatively (slow and to the left)
or positively (fast and to the right) stimulated. CC

83

Where does the nitrogen in the air come from?
TIM BRIAN, VIA EMAIL
Nitrogen makes up 78 per cent of the air
we breathe, and it’s thought that most of it
was initially trapped in the chunks of
primordial rubble that formed the Earth.
When they smashed together, they
coalesced and their nitrogen content has
been seeping out along the molten cracks
in the planet’s crust ever since. Nitrogen
can only be used by living organisms
after it has been ‘fixed’ into more reactive
Why do we get dizzy when we spin?
MAT T PAT TINSON, DE VON
When you move your head, the
acceleration is detected by hairs lining the
UKFGQHƃWKFƂNNGFVWDGUKP[QWTKPPGTGCT
If you spin for long enough, the brain gets
desensitised to the constant turn signals
84
compounds such as ammonia or oxides
of nitrogen. Nitrogen fixation is carried
out by bacteria, algae and human activity,
and once organisms have benefited from
it, some of the nitrogen compounds break
down and go back into the atmosphere as
nitrogen gas. Along with top-ups from
volcanic eruptions, the ‘nitrogen cycle’
has kept the level pretty constant for at
least 100 million years. RM
from your ear, and adjusts to zero them out.
When you stop, the ears correctly report
zero turning, but your brain is still actively
cancelling this out and so it thinks you are
now spinning in the opposite direction. LV
The ESO Very Large
Telescope is located in the
Atacama Desert, Chile
How large
a telescope
was needed
to image an
PHOTOS: GETTY X3, SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY ILLUSTRATION: RAJA LOCKEY
exoplanet?
EDWARD SE YMOUR, HOVE
The first-ever image of a planet
beyond the Solar System was taken
PHOTOS: GETTY X4 ILLUSTRATIONS: RAJA LOCKEY
in 2005 by astronomers using the
European Southern Observatory’s
Very Large Telescope (VLT) in
Chile. Known as 2M1207b, the
planet is about 1.5 times bigger than
Jupiter and around 170 light-years
away. It was detected using one of
the VLT’s four gigantic telescopes,
whose light-gathering mirrors are
an impressive 8.2 metres across. RM
 Is it possible for chickens to lay eggs
in space?
JOHNATHAN HOLME S, BRISTOL

Only one bird has ever actually laid an egg in space. A quail
aboard the Russian Soyuz TM-10 spacecraft laid an egg
while travelling to the Mir space station in 1990. It seems
likely that other birds would be able to physically lay eggs in
zero-g, but successfully incubating those eggs is much harder.
Experiments with both quail and chicken eggs in space show
much higher rates of birth defects in the bird embryos. LV

Are there any studies on the best

over-the-counter painkillers?
JEROME WRIGHT, NORWICH

Experience of pain is highly subjective so it is difficult to say

Love our Q&A which are the best painkillers. Studies tend to focus on
pages? Follow our particular aches and pains. For example, an analysis by The
Twitter feed Lancet of thousands of trials suggested that paracetamol
@sciencefocusQA doesn’t touch pain from osteoarthritis but a max dose of a
non-steroidal anti-inflammatory (NSAID) called diclofenac
does the job. NSAIDs such as ibuprofen reduce inflammation
and are best suited to muscular pain relief. The drugs block
enzymes that produce hormone-like chemicals called
prostaglandins, which promote inflammation, pain and
fever. Meanwhile, paracetamol is most suited to headaches
and reducing a high temperature. ED

85
How does trophy hunting affect
ff wild animal
populations?
STE VEN WHITE, BROMLEY
Since the days of the Roman
Empire, wild animals have been
slaughtered to prove power and
wealth. Bigger is better when it
comes to this ‘sport’, which means
that dominant, mature male rhinos,
elephants, lions, leopards and other
animals are the prime targets of
hunters. The artificially premature
loss of strong, healthy individuals
takes vital genes out of the breeding
pool which, over time, can result
in an overall decline in body size
and, where applicable, also horn or
tusk size. Removing these frontline
animals also undermines social
cohesion and can leave members
of prides and herds vulnerable to
attack by other members of their
own species. Although some argue
that money from trophy hunting
can help with conservation, there is
not enough evidence to convince us
that it can. CC
How thick is the
thickest fog?
NINA CUNNINGHAM, OXFORDSHIRE
By definition, fog has a visibility of less than
1km, but it can get much thicker than that. The
Met Office visibility scale runs down to a
Category X fog, where visibility is less than
20m. If fog gets mixed with industrial
pollution, it becomes smog and can be thicker
still. During the Great Smog of 1952, drivers
couldn’t see their own headlights! LV

By weight, which animal has the largest baby relative to body size?
EMILY CANE, NEWCASTLE

Despite a kiwi being about the size of a chicken, the female week of its life. Here you can see some other animals that
lays an egg that is about half her weight! It’s so big because it have enormous babies, as well as those that have teeny tiny
has an enormous yolk, which sustains the chick for the first offspring (with humans thrown in for good measure). LV

Kiwi (egg) Giraffe Beluga whale Human Elephant

(1/2) (1/10) (1/17) (1/22) (1/26)
PHOTOS: GETTY X9, ALAMY X2, FLPA X2

Giant clam Ocean sunfish Red kangaroo Honey possum Giant panda
(1/500,000,000) (1/1,500,000) (1/100,000) (1/2,400) (1/900)

86
W H AT I S T H I S ?

Wahweap Hoodoos
Nope, these aren’t weird, oversized
toadstools. They are a group of rock
structures called ‘hoodoos’, which
started forming more than 100 million
years ago. The columns, which are
located in Utah’s Grand Staircase-
Escalante National Monument, are
made of soft white sandstone that has
slowly eroded away over the years,
leaving caps consisting of a type of
harder brown sandstone.

87
 W H O R E A L LY I N V E N T E D ?
THE MRI
MACHINE
PETER MANSFIELD RAYMOND
PAUL LAUTERBUR DAMADIAN
With its ability to image the internal
organs and functioning of the body
without using X-rays, magnetic
resonance imaging (MRI) ranks as one of
the biggest medical breakthroughs, and
its development led to a Nobel Prize in
2003 for two scientists: Paul Lauterbur of
the State University of New York and
Peter Mansfield of the University of
Nottingham. But within a month of the
prize being announced, a full-page advert
appeared in The New York Times insisting
MRI was actually invented by a New York
doctor named Raymond Damadian.
MRI exploits so-called nuclear
magnetic resonance (NMR) in which
hydrogen nuclei in our bodies are first
gripped by powerful magnetic fields,
then stimulated into producing radio
waves. As these signals are affected by
the nature of the tissue, Damadian was
among those who thought NMR might
help with the early detection of cancer.
By the early 1970s the idea had shown
promise, and Damadian was granted a
patent for this use of NMR. However,
others were already going further, and
trying to create clear visual images from
the signals. Lauterbur and Mansfield are
widely regarded to have carried out the
most work towards solving the
extremely challenging technical issues
involved, turning MRI into the versatile
technique it is today. RM
88
Are any dog breeds close to becoming
a new species?
PHILLIP HOGG, VIA EMAIL
In a word, ‘no’. Domestic dogs evolved
between 17,000-33,000 years ago. Most
‘breeds’, which have been artificially
selected by humans, have arisen very
recently within the last 200 years.
Visually, a Chihuahua is the chalk to a
Great Dane’s cheese, yet they are still
the same species, Canis lupus
familiaris, and are direct descendants
of the grey wolf. All domestic dog
breeds are able to interbreed to give
Is being single bad for your health?
PAUL E VANS, BARKING
It is sometimes argued that being in a
relationship can offer health benefits.
The research cited in support of this
CTIWOGPV|UC[U VJCV VJQUG YJQ CTG
married are on average healthier than
those who are not. However, the
situation is likely to be much more
complex than this. For example, it is not
clear whether being in a relationship
offers health benefits or whether there
are other explanations for this
association. Furthermore, whereas being
in a relationship may be linked to
certain health advantages, it could bring
PHOTO: GETTY
birth to reproductively viable offspring.
This is because their genomes remain
relatively unchanged, despite their
physical characteristics appearing so
different. This key evidence tells us
that various dog breeds are not in the
running to become a new species any
time soon. It takes a long time for
mutations, which cause inheritable
changes to characteristics, to arise
within populations. CC
health risks too. Research suggests, for
example, that people who are married
are more likely to be overweight than
those who are not. Finally, one size does
not fit all. Whereas being in a happy
relationship may bring certain
advantages, being in a dysfunctional one
KU WPNKMGN[ VQ FQ UQ AGr
PHOTOS: GETTY X6 ILLUSTRATIONS: RAJA LOCKEY
How far do germs travel when we cough?
MIST Y, INDIA

Coughed droplets can enter

Powered by the diaphragm, the nose or mouth of
abdominal and rib muscles, innocent bystanders.
coughing is highly effective at Meanwhile, germs in settled
clearing irritants or mucus from droplets can live on some
the lungs. Each cough expels surfaces for hours, ready
thousands of saliva droplets at to transfer to an
up to 160km/h (100mph). unsuspecting victim.

Researchers at the Massachusetts

Institute of Technology, US, have
Each droplet is discovered that an invisible gas
potentially laden with cloud helps cough droplets to
viruses or bacteria and spread around a room. Smaller
can travel up to two droplets in the gas cloud are swept
metres, depending around by eddies, travelling
on size. further and taking longer to settle.

QU EST I O N O F T H E MO N T H

Why were birds the only dinosaurs

to survive the mass extinction?
EDWARD SE YMOUR, HOVE

The asteroid that caused the extinction event at the end

WINNER!
Edward Seymour wins an
of the Cretaceous period struck Earth with 60,000 times
iKettle, (£99.99, smarter.am).
the energy of the world’s entire nuclear arsenal. The
Use the app to heat water from
atmosphere would have glowed red hot for several
anywhere, or schedule it to be
hours and all the large dinosaurs that couldn’t
ready for when you get home
burrow underground or hide underwater were
from work. It’s compatible with
immediately roasted. When the smaller species
Amazon
mazon Alexa and Google
came out of hiding they found a charred landscape
Assistant, too!
and the air so thick with soot and sulphur dioxide
clouds that sunlight was almost completely
blocked out for the next year. It was too dark for
photosynthesis, so the herbivores died, then the
carnivores. Birds are descended from the
maniraptoran dinosaurs but they had two Caudipteryx was an
important adaptations that helped them survive. early maniraptoran
feathered dinosaur
First, they had beaks instead of teeth, which allowed
them to crack open seeds and nuts buried in the
topsoil. Second, their relatively large skull capacity
suggests that they were more intelligent than the other
reptiles. They may have lived in more complex social NEXT ISSUE:
groups that could cooperate and adapt to find new food Why do astronauts wear white?
sources in the radically different post-apocalyptic landscape.
This allowed them to eventually outcompete any other species of Can plants think?
small dinosaur that might have survived the initial impact. LV What is exotic matter?

Email your questions to questions@sciencefocus.com or submit online at sciencefocus.com/qanda

89
OUT THERE
W H AT WE CAN’T WAIT TO DO THIS MONTH
FEBRUARY 2018 EDITED BY JAMES LLOYD

01 MUSEUM OF THE MOON

W5, BELFAST
10 FEBRUARY – 4 MARCH 2018.

MARVEL AT
THE MOON
It’s not quite the Moon on a stick, but this
beautiful artwork from Luke Jerram is an
uncannily realistic representation of our
cosmic companion. Measuring seven
metres in diameter, the inflatable moon-balloon
uses high-res NASA imagery of the lunar
surface and internal lighting to create its
mesmeric effect, while a sound installation
from composer Dan Jones adds to the
ambience. It’s been touring the world since
2016, and was photographed here at the Saint-
George swimming pool in Rennes, France. Its
next stop will be Belfast’s W5 science centre,
before it heads to UK venues throughout the
year (see my-moon.org for the full list of dates).
Jerram has a knack for making art that
captures the public imagination. His other
projects have included a giant 95m water slide
down Bristol’s Park Street, a menagerie of
microbes rendered as glass sculptures, and
Play Me, I’m Yours, which has seen more than
1,850 street pianos being installed in cities
around the world.

90
 FIND OUT MORE
The making of this artwork is
explored in BBC Radio 4’s Why
The Moon, Luke?. Listen online
at bit.ly/moon_luke

91
OUT THERE
02 GET SMART
THE GENIUS
WITHIN Could boosting our brainpower be as simple as swallowing a pill? In his new
BY DAVID ADAM book, DAVID ADAM turns human guinea pig and tries out some mind hacks for
OUT 8 FEBRUARY
(£16.99, PICADOR). himself. He chats to JAMES LLOYD
What is cognitive enhancement?
Some people would argue that it
can include things like brain
training and caffeine, but I focus on
two methods at the leading edge of
neuroscience: smart pills and
electrical brain stimulation. The
idea is that these tools can be used
to change the way the brain works,
making us sharper and more
focused, for example, or better able
to recall facts or spot patterns.
A lot of cognitive enhancers
originally came from the medical
world, particularly for the
treatment of mental disorders. But
there’s a long tradition of healthy
people taking medicines to
enhance themselves – the classic
example is drugs in sport. Now
there’s a whole community of
people who are experimenting
with these brain hacks.
Tell me about your own experiments…
I decided to take the Mensa
entrance exam to measure my IQ,
and then again a year later, after I’d
tried out some of these cognitive
enhancers. I bought a brain
stimulation kit off the internet for
£50, which was an extremely basic
device: a 9V battery and two wires,
with an electrode at the end of each
one. I attached the electrodes to my
head using crocodile clips and a
saline-soaked sponge, all kept in
place by a knitted Spider-Man hat.
How’s this device supposed to work?
The nerve cells in the brain
use electrical impulses to
communicate. The idea behind
electrical brain stimulation is that
by applying a small current you
can make certain neurons more
responsive and easily stimulated.
By choosing where you place the
electrodes, you can target a region
of the brain involved in a particular
mental or physical activity. This is
92
all done through the scalp – it’s not
invasive. When I turned on my
device for the first time, I got a bit of
a fright, as a flash of light whizzed
across my vision – I think it was a
side effect of the electric current
stimulating my optic nerve.
Is it legal?
There are currently not any
regulations around electrical brain
stimulation. That’s something some
scientists aren’t happy about, as we
still don’t have a full picture of how
effective it is or what the electricity
is doing when it’s in there. Smart
pills are more of a legal grey area.
A lot of these pills are medicines,
so they’re not illegal but you’re
supposed to have a prescription.
One of the most common smart
drugs is modafinil, which is used
to treat sleep disorders such as
narcolepsy. In the UK, it’s not
illegal to possess it without a
prescription, but it is illegal to
supply it – unless you’re fulfilling
a prescription!
How did you get hold of some?
Again, I bought it off the internet.
I paid about £60, and then a brown
envelope dropped through my
letterbox a couple of weeks later.
I got the drugs tested at a lab to
confirm that they really were
modafinil, and then I tried one out.
It definitely felt like I could focus
much more easily on my task –
which was writing this book – and
time just seemed more productive.
It’s like a caffeine hit without the
shakes. But I would also say: don’t
try this at home. There are risks
involved with buying things like
this off the internet, and we don’t
know what the long-term side
effects of these drugs are.
Did your IQ improve?
In the week leading up to the
second Mensa test, I stimulated my
brain every night, choosing a
particular part of the brain that’s
thought to be involved in lateral
thinking, and I also took a
modafinil pill on the morning of
the test. My IQ did indeed jump up
from 125 to 135, which is a
significant amount. But this isn’t a
scientific experiment, of course.
Maybe the increase was just down
to natural variability, or maybe I
was subconsciously trying harder.
On the other hand, maybe it was
the cognitive enhancement. We’d
need a scientific study to find out.
Don’t these techniques give an
unfair advantage?
If this stuff works, then there are
lots of ethical questions. Some of it
comes down to how we think about
intelligence. In an exam, a smart
pill isn’t going to plant information
in the brain – it has to be there in
the first place. So is it giving an
unfair advantage? For certain
subjects such as maths, which are
based more on reasoning, you
could argue that it would. But there
are lots of other factors that affect
people’s performances. Some
people do better at a particular time
of the day; others get crippling
anxiety before an exam. Isn’t that
unfair too?
Do you think cognitive enhancement
will ever become widespread?
I think it’s unlikely that we’ll
ever have a headset that can
completely change someone’s
performance. But maybe we don’t
need to – maybe it’s just about
giving people a boost to help them
reach their potential. If a lot of
evidence comes out over the next
PHOTO: ALAMY
10 years showing that these
techniques are effective, then
they’re going to become extremely
attractive.

WARNING
Doctors recommend that you do not
take modafinil without an official prescription,
and scientists still do not know what the
long-term impacts of electrical brain
stimulation could be.
AUTHOR’S BOOKSHELF
Three books that inspired David Adam while writing The Genius Within
THE MISMEASURE OF MAN
BY STEPHEN JAY GOULD
(£14.99, W. W. NORTON & COMPANY).
“Flawed but readable
polemic on everything
from IQ tests to how
scientists should
approach research on
intelligence, and if they
should do so at all. The updated second
edition is considered the classic rebuttal
to the book The Bell Curve.”
THE BELL CURVE
BY RICHARD J HERRNSTEIN
AND CHARLES MURRAY
(£16.99, SIMON & SCHUSTER).
“Controversial analysis of
real and claimed group
differences in IQ. This is
not a recommendation or
endorsement, but I felt I should read it to
judge for myself. The text is more measured
than often claimed but it’s what one can
read between the lines that is disturbing.”
FEBRUARY 2018
SWITCHED ON
BY JOHN ELDER ROBISON
(£9.99, ONEWORLD).
“The latest in a series of
books about the author’s
experiences with
autism, this offers a
wonderful account of
how brain stimulation
seemed to activate long-dormant
emotional awareness. And the results
weren’t as positive as you might think.”
93
OUT THERE

03 FROM ICE TO FIRE: THE INCREDIBLE

SCIENCE OF TEMPERATURE
BBC FOUR, FEBRUARY
CHECK RADIOTIMES.COM FOR DETAILS.

CHILL OUT
Most of us are like Goldilocks: we don’t like things
too hot or too cold. But behind the prickliest of heats
and the most mind-numbing of colds is some
extraordinary science. In her new three-part series,
BBC Focus columnist Dr Helen Czerski reveals how
temperature plays a crucial role in life on Earth,
from the inner workings of our cells to the
cataclysmic processes that shape entire continents.
Discover where the coldest place in the Universe
is, and what happened when Helen plunged into
some horrendously cold water. Find out how the
Vikings tamed heat to become expert ironworkers,
and why the steam engine represented such a huge
leap for human progress.
“Temperature is the most fundamental feature of
every location in the Universe, dictating what is
possible and how quickly things happen,” says
Helen. “My favourite bit of the series was being the
first crew to film the UK’s new polar research ship
being built [the RRS Sir David Attenborough], and to
see the ingenious engineering that will keep it safe
in the Arctic and Antarctic waters.”

04 PREPARE FOR
THE NEXT
PANDEMIC
CONTAGION! THE BBC
FOUR PANDEMIC
BBC FOUR, 27 FEBRUARY.

A century since the Spanish flu pandemic took up to 100 million lives
worldwide, influenza is still causing problems. With the viruses constantly
evolving to outsmart their hosts, many experts agree that it’s only a matter of
PHOTO: ROBERT HOLLINGWORTH, MUSEUM OF LONDON, BBC

time before the next flu pandemic races around the globe.
So what can we do about it? In an ambitious citizen science experiment for
BBC Four, mathematician Dr Hannah Fry and emergency medic Dr Javid
Abdelmoneim have created a virtual pandemic using a specially-created
app. In this 90-minute special, we’ll follow Hannah as she adopts the role of
Patient Zero, launching the outbreak on the streets of Surrey. Will she be
able to persuade enough people to download the app? And, if she does, what
can the dataset tell us about how a deadly flu virus might spread across the
UK, and how it might be slowed?
Meanwhile, Javid looks at the latest research that’s aiming to stop flu in its
tracks. He explores a project that’s infecting healthy volunteers with virus
cells, with the aim of finding out why some people are especially contagious
(so-called ‘super-spreaders’), and visits a factory that will produce vaccines
when the next pandemic emerges.

94
 FEBRUARY 2018

05
FATBERG!
MUSEUM OF LONDON
SEE THE FATBERG
Last September, Thames Water made a startling discovery. Lurking in
the sewers beneath Whitechapel was a monstrous 130-tonne ‘fatberg’.
Now, the Museum of London is putting it on display. We asked
9 FEBRUARY – 1 JULY
FREE ENTRY. SHARON ROBINSON-CALVER, head of conservation and collection care
at the museum, how they made it happen
What makes a fatberg? display – in a protective case of course! it wasn’t quite so bad – more like
A fatberg is a congealed mass of fats, oils The original fatberg has now been dirty toilets.
and greases, plus things that go down the removed from the sewer and converted
toilet that shouldn’t be flushed, such as into biodiesel, so we’ll be displaying the How can we stop fatbergs from forming
nappies, wet wipes, sanitary products and last remaining piece – it’s about the size of in the first place?
condoms. So pretty unpleasant really! a shoebox. There are around 300,000 sewage
The Whitechapel fatberg really captured blockages in the UK every year, and wet
the public imagination because it was the What does the fatberg smell like? wipes make up 93 per cent of the problem.
biggest one that we’d ever found – over I didn’t come face-to-face with the So the message from Thames Water is
250 metres long. original fatberg, but I’ve been told that it only to flush the three ‘p’s down the toilet:
smelled like a combination of rotting meat poo, pee and toilet paper. And put
Why did the Museum of London decide to and rotting nappies. By the time I got to cooking fats and oils in the bin, not
display a fatberg? experience it myself, several weeks later, down the sink.
Many of the items in our collection have
been discovered in cesspits – things such
as teapots, bottles and coins – and these
tell us a lot about how people once lived.
In some respects, fatbergs are no different
– they’re human-made objects that reflect
modern issues such as population
expansion, changes in diet, and the
pressures we’re putting on London’s
Victorian sewer system. It’s an important
part of the story of the city, showing the
challenges that urban living can create.

How did you go about getting a sample?

When we first heard about the monster
fatberg, we asked Thames Water to take
some samples for us. To excavate it, they
blast the fatberg with high-pressure water
jets, breaking it into smaller chunks that
can be sucked up into a tanker. The
fatberg is toxic – it off-gasses carbon
monoxide and hydrogen sulphide,
and there’s a real risk of bacterial diseases
– so we spent some time analysing the
samples to understand how we could
handle and display them safely.

What’s the best solution you came up with?

Once we’d X-rayed the samples to check
for things like hypodermic needles, we
slowly air-dried them at room
temperature, which turned them from
their sloppy, mushy consistency to the
harder, more oxidised material that you
get sticking to the sewer walls. Once it’s
dried and been left to off-gas, the material Yes, this is the nicest picture
becomes chemically stable enough to we could find…

95
PUZZLES

BBC FOCUS CROSSWORD

GIVE YOUR BRAIN A WORKOUT
DOWN
1 Racy robe worn by fast driver (3,5)
2 Old tales revolving around bones (6)
3 Rubs carelessly – it’s a pain in the
shoulder (8)
4 Engineers have a brace to fix (6)
5 A group of detectives managed to
contain one form of pollution (4,4)
6 Storage for starch puts locale
out (10)
7 Greeting fable from the past (7)
8 Tethering lieutenant with a song (6)
11 Suit a high-pitched instrument (7)
16 Wives get sick round tree (6)
19 Nutrition gets left – it’s a disaster (5)
20 Howl from an alcove (3)
22 Start playing notes (5)
23 Pressure to formulate a rule about
the lungs (6)
25 Greek scientist building new semi
with journalist (10)
26 Vehicle with its own set of
conductors (3)
27 German solved clue, so found
sugar (7)
30 Learn ode about a shrub (8)
31 Disinfectant caused stomach pain
around bar, sadly (8)
32 Clerk may be a soprano or a tenor (8)
33 Skilful with a French key that’s
inoperative (7)
35 Musical agreement (6)
36 Excessive supply, with space for
protein mixture (6)
37 Distant handset (6)

ACROSS
9 Arrange a shoot and employ a kiln (9) 29 A sign, like this clue (6)
10 Call Eric terribly priestly (8) 31 Bunch caught by desire and hesitation (7)
12 Artist takes fellow to be a bird (4) 34 Cite a ruse to improve burn (9)
13 When sentry heard of divine residence (6) 36 Cigar rite carried out for old person (9)
14 Swimmer needs money to get terribly fit (7) 38 Fit for occupation (7)
15 Depreciation from one of the taps (4,5) 39 Run one off in a cell (6)
17 Equipment tears us apart about father (9) 40 The ruler in the mirror (4) A N SW E R S
18 Offers, as a prize, a gentleman thief (7) 41 Building material that’s not imaginary (8)
20 Chicken giving weight to a boxer (6) 42 Pretence about finding current in middle (9) For the answers, visit
21 Return of a large youngster (4) bit.ly/BBCFocusCW
24 Glow by railway causes heart problem (8) Please be aware the
26 Food poisoning throws limbs out (8) website address is
28 The game I play in Latin (4) case-sensitive.

96
FOCUS MARKETPLACE To advertise in this space please contact Jenna-Vie.Harvey@immediate.co.uk
or telephone 0117 300 8540

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in any room

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Available as frameless acrylic or
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MY L I F E S C I E N T I F I C
Dr Susan Finkbeiner
This month, Dr Susan Finkbeiner from the University of
Chicago talks to Helen PilcherCDQWVECVEJKPIDWVVGTƃKGU
in the jungle and strutting her stuff on the catwalk
What is it that you do?
Much of Susan’s
work focuses on
I study evolution of patterns in
Heliconius butterfly wings. I often spend
butterflies. The
bright colours
months at a time working in
seen in this genus jungles in places like Costa
warn predators
that they taste Rica, Ecuador and Panama.
unpleasant.
What’s that like?
Some of the field sites are
really remote. There’s one in
Ecuador that takes 15 hours to get
to from Quito, via bus, 4x4 and
boat. It’s surrounded by scattered
indigenous communities so you get
the opportunity to see what their
way of life is like. Every now and
then, the kids bring you cool
animals to see like baby monkeys.
What do you do in the jungle?
Sometimes we just collect
butterflies. They’re high in the
98
canopy, so our nets are up to nine
metres long. It takes a lot of practice
to catch a butterfly at that range.
Other times, we study predation, so
we lay out hundreds of fake,
paper-winged butterflies then
return later to see whether or not
they have been nibbled by birds.
Is your fieldwork dangerous?
When living in a city, my biggest
worry is missing a train or having a
bad hair day. But in the field, you
have to worry about deadly snakes,
being stung by really gnarly and
nasty arthropods, or being stalked
by howler monkeys.
You’ve been stalked by a monkey?
I’ve been peed on by howler
monkeys. More than once. They
can be loud if they want to shoo
you away, or they can be quiet and
then all of a sudden you think it’s
raining! It could be worse though.
Capuchin monkeys are notorious
for going to the bathroom in their
hand and then throwing it at you.
How did you end up being a model?
When I was in high school I did
beauty pageants, but I knew my
heart was with science. I thought
about it again recently and realised
that if I became a model, I could
help crush stereotypes. I think it’s
important to show that models can
be smart and have other interests,
and that scientists don’t have to be
stuck in the lab all the time. I want
to show that you can be girly and
dress up, and at the same time be a
scientist and go running around in
a muddy jungle. So I signed up with
a modelling agency in Boston.
You recently modelled at London
Fashion Week. What was that like?
It’s like being Cinderella for a
weekend. I get to wear amazing
outfits made by up-and-coming
designers who have made clothes
for the likes of Katy Perry and Paris
Hilton. On the catwalk, the goal is
not to walk too fast, because that’s
your instinct if you’re nervous. It’s
also a real challenge not to smile.
Do we need more entomologists?
Absolutely. I think everyone has an
entomologist in them when they’re
young, but then grow out of it for all
sorts of reasons. Maybe their
parents tell them it isn’t a real job.
But the reality is that I make a
living from going into the Amazon
and collecting butterflies. I want to
communicate to young people that
they should never lose their passion
for science and that there’s always a
way to follow your dreams.
Dr Susan Finkbeiner is a postdoctoral
researcher who studies the evolution of
butterfly wing patterns. She tweets from
@Fink_about_it
ILLUSTRATION: SAM GREEN
D I S C OV E R M O R E
To listen to episodes of
The Life Scientific with
top scientists, visit
bit.ly/life_scientific
NEXT ISSUE: DR ZOE WILLIAMS
 Seeing is
believing...

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